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THE  WORKS 

OP 

THOMAS  DE  QUINCEY. 

RIVERSIDE  EDITION. 
VOLUME  III. 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES; 


THE  AUTOBIOGRAPHY  OF  AN  ENGLISH 
OPIUM-EATER. 


THOMAS  DE  QUINCEY. 


BOSTON: 
HOUGHTON,  MIFFLIN  AND  COMPANY. 


Entered,  according  to  Act  of  Congress,  in  the  year  1853,  by 

TiCKNOR  AND  FIELDS, 

the  Clerk's  Office  of  the  District  Court  of  the  District  of  Massachusetts. 


Copyright,  1876, 
By  HURD  and  HOUGHTON. 


The  Riverside  Press,  Cambridge: 
Printed  by  H.  O.  Houghton  and  Cotn^anjf* 


mVxWD\ji;TIOK 


[This  volume  completes  the  autobiographic  portion  of 
De  Quincej's  works.  The  ver/  full  and  free  reference  to 
his  contemporaries  renders  it  especially  interesting  to  the 
student  of  English  literature  of  this  period,  since  De 
Quincey's  associates  were  almost  wholly  of  the  guild  of 
letters.  One  name  occurs  several  times  in  connection 
with  that  of  the  Wordsworth  family,  the  name  of  Pro- 
fessor Wilson,  but  in  this  volume  no  extended  account  is 
given  of  him.  In  a  future  volume  will  be  given  a  sketch 
of  Wilson,  not  hitherto  published  in  any  collection  of  De 
Quincey's  writings. 

No  one  can  read  De  Quincey's  references  to  the  Words- 
worth family,  without  perceiving  a  certain  change  of  atti- 
tude from  the  first  fervent  idolatry.  Without  aiming  to 
strike  the  balance  in  a  question  of  this  kind,  it  seems  right 
to  give  the  somewhat  severe  comments  made  upon  the  re- 
lation of  De  Quincey  and  Wordsworth,  by  the  late  Miss 
Harriet  Martin  eau,  who  was  a  neighbor  of  both  in  West- 
moreland. It  occurs  in  her  volume  of  "  Biographical 
Sketches  "  collected  from  the  columns  of  the  "  London 
Daily  News." 

"  As  years  passed  on,  he  not  only  became  a  more  help- 
less victim  to  his  prominent  vice,  but  manifested  an  in- 
creasing insensibility  to  the  most  ordinary  requisitions  of 
honor  and  courtesy,  to  say  nothing  of  gratitude  and  sin- 
cerity.   Li  his  hungry  days  in  London  he  would  not  beg 

1 179595 


6 


INTRODUCTION. 


or  borrow.  Five  years  later  he  wrote  to  Wordsworth,  in 
admiration  and  sympathy  ;  received  an  invitation  to  his 
Westmoreland  valley  ;  went,  more  than  once,  within  a 
few  miles ;  and  withdrew  and  returned  to  Oxford,  unable 
to  conquer  his  painful  shyness  ;  —  returned  at  last  to  live 
there,  in  the  very  cottage  which  had  been  Wordsworth's  ; 
received  for  himself,  his  wife,  and  a  growing  family  of 
children,  an  uri intermitting  series  of  friendly  and  neigh- 
borly offices  ;  was  necessarily  admitted  to  much  house- 
hold confidence,  and  favored  with  substantial  aid,  which 
was  certainly  not  given  through  any  strong  liking  for  his 
manners,  conversation,  or  character.  How  did  he  recom- 
pense all  this  exertion  and  endurance  on  his  behalf?  In 
after  years,  when  living  (we  believe)  at  Edinburgh,  and 
pressed  by  debt,  he  did  for  once  exert  himself  to  write  ; 
and  what  he  wrote  was  an  exposure,  in  a  disadvantage- 
ous light,  of  everything  about  the  Wordsworths  which  he 
knew  merely  by  their  kindness.  He  wrote  papers  which 
were  eagerly  read,  and  of  course  duly  paid  for,  in  which 
Wordsworth's  personal  foibles  were  malignantly  exhibited 
with  ingenious  aggravations.  The  infirmities  of  one 
member  of  the  family,  the  personal  blemish  of  another, 
and  the  human  weaknesses  of  all,  were  displayed ;  and 
all  for  the  purpose  of  deepening  the  dislike  against 
Wordsworth  himself,  which  the  receiver  of  his  money, 
the  eater  of  his  dinners,  and  the  dreary  provoker  of  his 
patience  strove  to  excite.  Moreover,  he  perpetrated  an 
act  of  treachery  scarcely  paralleled,  we  hope,  in  the  his- 
tory of  Literature.  In  the  confidence  of  their  most  fa- 
miliar days  Wordsworth  had  communicated  portions  of 
his  posthumous  poem  to  his  guest,  who  was  perfectly 
well  aware  that  the  work  was  to  rest  in  darkness  and 
silence  till  after  the  Poet's  death.  In  these  magazine 
articles  De  Quincey  —  using  for  this  atrocious  purposa 


INTRODUCTION. 


? 


his  fine  gift  of  memory  —  published  a  passage  which  he 
informed  us  was  of  far  higher  merit  than  anything  else 
we  had  to  expect.  And  what  was  Wordsworth's  conduct 
under  this  unequalled  experience  of  bad  faith  and  bad 
feeling  ?  While  so  many  anecdotes  were  going  of  the 
Poet's  fireside,  the  following  ought  to  be  added.  An  old 
friend  was  talking  with  him  by  that  fireside,  and  men- 
tioned De  Quincey's  magazine  articles.  Wordsworth 
begged  to  be  spared  any  account  of  them,  saying  that 
the  man  had  long  passed  away  from  the  family  life  and 
mind ;  and  he  did  not  wish  to  ruffle  himself  in  a  useless 
way  about  a  misbehavior  which  could  not  be  remedied. 
The  friend  acquiesced,  saying,  '  Well,  I  will  tell  you  only 
one  thing  that  he  says,  and  then  we  will  talk  of  other 
things.  He  says  your  wife  is  too  good  for  you.'  The 
old  Poet's  dim  eyes  lighted  up  instantly,  and  he  started 
from  his  seat,  and  flung  himself  against  the  mantelpiece, 
with  his  back  to  the  fire,  as  he  cried  with  loud  enthusi- 
asm, — '  And  that 's  true  !  There  he  is  right !  '  and  his 
disgust  and  contempt  for  the  traitor  were  visibly  mod- 
erated. 

"  During  a  long  course  of  years  De  Quincey  went  on 
dreaming  always  —  sometimes  scheming  works  of  high 
value  and  great  efficacy  which  were  never  to  exist ;  prom- 
ising largely  to  booksellers  and  others,  and  failing  through 
a  weakness  so  deep-seated  that  it  should  have  prevented 
his  making  any  promises.  When  his  three  daughters 
were  grown  up,  and  his  wife  was  dead,  he  lived  in  a 
pleasant  cottage  at  Lasswade,  near  Edinburgh  —  well 
known  by  name  to  those  who  have  never  seen  its  beauties, 
as  the  scene  of  Scott's  early  married  life  and  first  great 
achievements  in  literature.  There,  while  the  family  for- 
tunes were  expressly  made  contingent  on  his  abstinence 
from  his  drug,  De  Quincey  did  abstain,  or  observe  mod 


3 


INTR(  \  »UCTION. 


eration.  His  flow  ol  conv  ^Tsation  was  then  the  delight 
of  old  acquaintance  and  adiibing  strangers,  who  came  to 
hear  the  charmer  and  to  r.).',eive  the  impression,  which 
could  never  be  lost,  of  the  singular  figure  and  counte- 
nance and  the  finely  modulai-cd  voice,  which  were  like 
nothing  else  in  the  world.  It  ^  as  a  strange  thing  to  look 
upon  that  fragile  form,  and  features  which  might  be  those 
of  a  dying  man,  and  to  hear  such  utterances  as  his  :  now 
the  strangest  comments  and  insignificant  incidents  ;  now 
pregnant  remarks  on  great  subjects  ;  and  then,  malignant 
gossip,  virulent  and  base,  but  delivered  with  an  air  and  a 
voice  of  philosophical  calmness  and  intellectual  commen- 
tary such  as  caused  the  disgust  of  th^  listener  to  be  largely 
qualified  with  amusement  and  sui  ]  rise.  One  good  thing 
was,  that  nobody's  name  and  fame  could  be  really  injured 
by  anything  De  Quincey  could  say  There  was  such  a 
grotesque  air  about  the  mode  of  hn  3vil-speaking,  and  it 
was  so  gratuitous  and  excessive,  thaJi  the  hearer  could  not 
help  regarding  it  as  a  singular  sort  of  mtellectual  exer- 
cise, or  an  effort  in  the  speaker  to  observe,  for  once,  some- 
thing outside  of  himself,  rather  than  as  an^  token  of 
actual  feeling  toward  the  ostensible  objec*.  *  1 


CONTENTS. 


PHAPTEI 

I.  Literary  Novitiate  11 

II.  Sir  H.  Davy.— Mr.  Godwin. —Mrs.  Grant.  .  39 
III.  Recollections  of  Charles  Lamb  .  .  .  .64 
lY.  Recollections  of  Charles  Lamb  ....  99 

V.  Walladmor   ...  137 

VI.  Samuel  Taylor  Coleridge  153 

Vn.  Samuel  Taylor  Coleridge  .  ....  192 

Vni.  Samuel  Taylor  Coleridge  221 

IX.  Samuel  Taylor  Coleridge  239 

X.  William  Wordsworth  260 

XI.  William  Wordsworth  299 

XII.  William  Wordsworth  344 

XIII.  Wordsworth  and  Southey       .      .      .      .      .  373 

XIV.  Southey,  Wordsworth,  and  Coleridge      .      .  410 

XV.  Recollections  of  Grasmere   425 

XVI.  The  Saracen's  Head  467 

XVII.  Society  of  the  Lakes  481 

XVIII.  Charles  Lloyd  506 

XIX.  Society  of  the  Lakes  533 

XX.  Society  of  the  Lakes  568 

XXI.  Walking  Stewart.  —  Edward  Irving.  —  William 

W  ORDSWORTH  695 

XXII.  Talfourd.  —  The  London  Magazine.  —  Junius.  — 

Clare.  —  Cunningham  622 

SwXni.  Libellous  Attack  by  a  London  Joubnal.  —  DuBi/- 

LINO      .       .       .  661 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES 


CHAPTER  I. 

LITERARY  NOVITUTE. 

It  was  in  the  year  1801,  whilst  yet  at  school,  that  1 
made  my  first  literary  acquaintance.  This  was  with  a 
gentleman  now  dead,  and  little,  at  any  time,  known  in 
the  literary  world  ;  indeed,  not  at  all ;  for  his  authorship 
was  confined  to  a  department  of  religious  literature  as 
obscure  and  as  narrow  in  its  influence  as  any  that  can  be 
named  —  viz.  Swedenborgianism.  Already,  on  the  bare 
mention  of  that  word,  a  presumption  arises  against  any 
man,  that,  writing  much  (or  writing  at  all)  for  a  body  of 
doctrines  so  apparently  crazy  as  those  of  Mr.  Swedenborg, 
a  man  must  have  bid  adieu  to  all  good  sense  and  manli- 
ness of  mind.  Indeed,  this  is  so  much  of  a  settled  case, 
that  even  to  have  written  against  Mr.  Swedenborg  would 
be  generally  viewed  as  a  suspicious  act,  requiring  explana- 
tion, and  not  very  easily  admitting  of  it.  Mr,  Swedenborg 
I  call  him,  because  I  understand  that  his  title  to  call 
himself  '  Baron,'  is  imaginary ;  or  rather  he  never  did 
call  himself  by  any  title  of  honor  —  that  mistake  having 
originated  amongst  his  followers  in  this  country,  who 

[11] 


12 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


have  chosen  to  designate  him  as  the  '  Honorable '  and  aa 
the  'Baron*  Swedenborg,  byway  of  translating,  to  the 
ear  of  England,  some  one  or  other  of  those  irrepresentabh 
distinctions,  Legations,  Rath,  Hofrath,  &g.,  which  are 
tossed  about'  with  so  much  profusion  in  the  courts  of 
continental  Europe,  on  both  sides  the  Baltic.  For  myself, 
I  cannot  think  myself  qualified  to  speak  of  any  man's 
mi  tings  without  a  regular  examination  of  some  one  or 
two  among  those  which  his  admirers  regard  as  his  best 
performances.  Yet,  as  any  happened  to  fall  in  my  way,  1 
have  looked  into  them ;  and  the  impression  left  upon  my 
mind  was  certainly  not  favorable  to  their  author.  They 
labored,  to  my  feeling,  with  two  opposite  qualities  of 
annoyance,  but  which  I  believe  not  uncommonly  found 
united  in  lunatics  —  excessive  dulness  or  matter-of-factness 
in  the  execution,  with  excessive  extravagance  in  the 
conceptions.  The  result,  at  least,  was  most  unhappy  : 
for,  of  all  writers,  Swedenborg  is  the  only  one  I  ever 
heard  of  who  has  contrived  to  strip  even  the  shadowy 
world  beyond  the  grave  of  all  its  mystery  and  all  its  awe. 
From  the  very  heaven  of  heavens,  he  has  rent  away  the 
veil ;  no  need  for  seraphs  to  '  tremble  while  they  gaze  ; ' 
for  the  familiarity  with  which  all  objects  are  invested, 
makes  it  impossible  that  even  poor  mortals  should  find 
any  reason  to  tremble.  Until  I  saw  this  book,  I  had  not 
conceived  it  possible  to  carry  an  atmosphere  so  earthy, 
t-nd  steaming  with  the  vapors  of  earth,  into  regions  which, 
by  early  connection  in  our  infant  thoughts  with  the  sanc- 
tities of  death,  have  a  hold  upon  the  reverential  affections 
such  as  they  rarely  lose.  In  this  view,  I  should  conceive 
that  Swedenborg,  if  it  were  at  all  possible  for  him  to 
become  a  popular  author,  would,  at  the  same  time,  become 
immensely  mischievous.  He  would  dereligionize  men  be- 
yond all  other  authors  whatsoever. 


LITERACY  NOVITIATE. 


13 


Little  could  this  character  of  Swedenborg's  writings  — 
ihis,  indeed,  least  of  all  —  have  been  suspected  from  the 
temper,  mind,  or  manners  of  my  new  friend.  He  was 
the  most  spiritual  looking,  the  most  saintly  in  outward 
aspect,  of  all  human  beings  whom  I  have  known  through- 
out life.  He  was  rather  tall,  pale,  and  thin  ;  the  most 
unfleshly,  the  most  of  a  sublimated  spirit  dwelling  already 
more  than  half  in  some  purer  world,  that  a  poet  could 
have  imagined.  He  was  already  aged  when  I  first  knew 
him,  a  clergyman  of  the  Church  of  England ;  which  may 
seem  strange  in  connection  with  his  Swedenborgianism, 
but  he  was  however  so.  He  was  rector  of  a  large  parish 
in  a  large  town,  the  more  active  duties  of  which  parish 
were  discharged  by  his  curate ;  but  much  of  the  duties 
within  the  church  were  still  discharged  by  himself,  and 
with  such  exemplary  zeal,  that  his  parishioners,  afterwards 
celebrating  the  fiftieth  anniversary,  or  golden  jubilee  of 
his  appointment  to  the  living,  (the  twenty-fifth  anniversary 
is  called  in  Germany  the  silver  —  the  fiftieth,  the  golden 
jubilee,)  went  farther  than  is  usual,  in  giving  a  public 
expression  and  a  permanent  shape  to  their  sentiments  of 
love  and  veneration.  I  am  surprised,  on  reflection,  that 
this  venerable  clergyman  should  have  been  unvexed  by 
Episcopal  censures.  He  might,  and  I  dare  say  would, 
keep  back  the  grosser  parts  of  Swedenborg's  views  from  a 
Dublic  display ;  but,  in  one  point,  it  would  not  be  easy 
for  a  man  so  conscientious  to  make  a  compromise  between 
his  ecclesiastical  duty  and  his  private  belief ;  for  I  have 
since  found,  though  I  did  not  then  know  it,  that  Sweden- 
borg  held  a  very  peculiar  creed  on  the  article  of  atonement. 
From  the  slight  pamphlet  which  let  me  into  this  secret, 
I  could  not  accurately  collect  the  exact  distinctions  of  his 
creed ;  but  it  was  very  different  from  that  of  the  English 
Church. 


14 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


However,  my  friend  continued  unvexed  for  a  good  deal 
more  than  fifty  years,  enjoying  that  peace,  external  as 
well  as  internal,  which,  by  so  eminent  a  title,  belonged  to 
a  spirit  so  evangelically  meek  and  dovelike.  I  mention 
him  chiefly  for  the  sake  of  describing  his  interesting 
house  and  household,  so  different  from  all  which  belong 
to  this  troubled  age,  and  his  impressive  style  of  living. 
The  house  seemed  almost  monastic ;  and  yet  it  stood  in 
the  centre  of  one  of  the  largest,  busiest,  noisiest  towns 
in  England  ;  and  the  whole  household  seemed  to  have 
stepped  out  of  their  places  in  some  Vandyke,  or  even 
some  Titian  picture,  from  a  forgotten  century  and  another 
climate.  On  knocking  at  the  door,  which  of  itself  seemed 
an  outrage  to  the  spirit  of  quietness  which  brooded  over 
the  place,  you  were  received  by  an  ancient  man-servant 
in  the  sober  livery  which  belonged  traditionally  to  Mr. 
Clowes's  family  ;  for  he  was  of  a  gentleman's  descent, 
and  had  had  the  most  finished  education  of  a  gentleman. 
This  venerable  old  butler  put  me  in  mind  always,  by  his 
noiseless  steps,  of  the  Castle  of  Indolence,  where  the 
porter  or  usher  walked  about  in  shoes  that  were  shod  with 
felt,  lest  any  rude  echoes  might  be  roused.  An  ancient 
housekeeper  was  equally  venerable,  equally  gentle  in  her 
deportment,  quiet  in  her  movements,  and  inaudible  in  her 
tread.  One  or  other  of  these  upper  domestics,  for  the 
others  rarely  crossed  my  path,  ushered  me  always  into 
some  room,  expressing,  by  its  furniture,  its  pictures,  and 
its  colored  windows,  the  solemn  tranquillity  which,  for 
half  a  century,  had  reigned  in  that  mansion.  Among  the 
pictures  were  more  than  one  of  St.  John,  the  beloved 
apostle,  by  Italian  masters.  Neither  the  features  nor  the 
expression  were  very  wide  of  Mr.  Clowes 's  own  counte- 
nance ;  and  had  it  been  possible  to  forget  the  gross  char- 
acter of  Swedenborg's  reveries,  or  to  substitute  for  these 


LITBKAKY  NOVITIATE. 


15 


fleshly  dreams  the  awful  visions  of  the  Apocalypse,  one 
might  have  imagined  easily  that  the  pure,  saintly,  and 
childlike  evangelist  had  been  once  again  recalled  to  this 
earth,  and  that  this  most  quiet  of  mansions  was  some  cell 
in  the  island  of  Patmos.  Whence  came  the  stained  glass 
of  the  windows,  I  know  not ;  and  whether  it  were  stained 
or  painted.  The  revolutions  of  that  art  are  known  from 
Horace  Walpole's  account ;  and,  nine  years  after  this 
period,  I  found  that,  in  Birmingham,  where  the  art  of 
staining  glass  was  chiefly  practised,  no  trifling  sum  was 
charged  even  for  a  vulgar  lacing  of  no  great  breadth 
round  a  few  drawing-room  windows,  which  one  of  my 
friends  thought  fit  to  introduce  as  an  embellishment. 
These  windows,  however,  of  my  clerical  friend  were 
really  ^storied  windows,'  having  Scriptural  histories 
represented  upon  them.  A  crowning  ornament  to  the 
library  or  principal  room,  was  a  sweet-tone4  organ,  an- 
cient, and  elaborately  carved  in  its  wood- work,  at  which 
my  venerable  friend  readily  sate  down,  and  performed 
the  music  of  anthems  as  often  as  I  asked  him,  sometimes 
accompanying  it  with  his  voice,  which  was  tremulous 
from  old  age,  but  neither  originally  unmusical,  nor  (as 
might  be  perceived)  untrained. 

Often,  from  the  storms  and  uproars  of  this  world,  I 
have  looked  back  upon  this  most  quiet  and  I  believe  most 
innocent  abode,  (had  I  said  saintly,  I  should  hardly  have 
erred,)  connecting  it  in  thought  with  Little  Gidding,  the 
famous  mansion  (in  Huntingdonshire,  I  believe)  of  the 
Farrers,  an  interesting  family  in  the  reigns  of  James  I. 
and  Charles  I.  Of  the  Farrers  there  is  a  long  and  cir- 
cumstantial biographical  account,  and  of  the  conventual 
discipline  maintained  at  Little  Gidding.  For  many  years 
it  was  the  rule  at  Gidding  —  and  it  was  the  wish  of  the 
Parrers  to  have  transmitted  that  practice  through  sue- 


16 


LITERABY  REMINISCENCES. 


ceeding  centuries  —  that  a  musical  or  cathedral  service 
should  be  going  on  at  every  hour  of  night  and  day  in  the 
chapel  of  the  mansion.  Let  the  traveller,  at  what  hour 
he  would,  morning  or  evening,  summer  or  winter,  and  in 
what  generation  or  century  soever,  happen  to  knock  at 
the  gate  of  Little  Gidding,  it  was  the  purpose  of  Nicholas 
Farrer  —  a  sublime  purpose  —  that  always  he  should  hear 
the  blare  of  the  organ,  sending  upwards  its  surging 
volumes  of  melody,  God's  worship  for  ever  proceeding, 
anthems  of  praise  for  ever  ascending,  and  jubilates  echo- 
ing without  end  or  known  beginning.  One  stream  of 
music,  in  fact,  never  intermitting,  one  vestal  fire  of 
devotional  praise  and  thanksgiving,  was  to  connect  the 
beginnings  with  the  ends  of  generations,  and  to  link  one 
century  into  another.  Allowing  for  the  sterner  asceticism 
of  N.  Farrer  —  partly  arising  out  of  the  times,  partly  out 
of  personal  character,  and  partly,  perhaps,  out  of  his 
travels  in  Spain  —  my  aged  friend's  arrangement  of  the 
day,  and  the  training  of  his  household,  might  seem  to 
have  been  modelled  on  the  plans  of  Mr.  Farrer,  whom, 
however,  he  might  never  have  heard  of.  There  was 
also,  in  each  house,  the  same  union  of  religion  with  some 
cultivation  of  the  ornamental  arts,  or  some  expression  of 
respect  for  them.  In  each  case,  a  monastic  severity,  that 
might,  under  other  circumstances,  have  terminated  in  the 
gloom  of  a  La  Trappe,  had  been  softened  by  English 
sociality,  and  by  the  habits  of  a  gentleman's  education, 
into  a  devotional  pomp,  reconcilable  with  Protestant  views. 
When,  however,  remembering  this  last  fact  in  Mr.  Clowes's 
case,  (the  fact  I  mean  of  his  liberal  education,)  I  have 
endeavored  to  explain  the  possibility  of  one  so  much 
adorned  by  all  the  accomplishments  of  a  high-bred  gen- 
tleman, and  one  so  truly  pious,  falling  into  the  grossnesa 
—  almost  the  sensuality  —  which  appears  to  besiege  tha 


LITERARY  NOYITIATE. 


17 


\risions  of  Swedenborg ;  I  fancy  that  the  whole  may  be 
explained  out  of  the  same  cause  which  occasionally  may 
be  descried,  through  a  distance  of  two  complete  centuries^ 
as  weighing  heavily  upon  the  Farrers  —  viz.  the  dire  mo- 
notony of  daily  life,  when  visited  by  no  irritations  either 
of  hope  or  fear  —  no  hopes  from  ambition,  no  fears  from 
poverty. 

Nearly  (if  not  quite)  sixty  years  did  my  venerable 
friend  inhabit  that  same  parsonage  house,  without  any 
incident  more  personally  interesting  to  himself  than  a 
cold  or  a  sore  throat.  And  I  suppose  that  he  resorted  to 
Swedenborg —  reluctantly,  perhaps,  at  the  first  —  as  to  a 
book  of  fairy  tales  connected  with  his  professional  studies. 
And  one  thing  I  am  bound  to  add  in  candor,  which  may 
have  had  its  weight  with  him,  that  more  than  once,  on 
casually  turning  over  a  volume  of  Swedenborg,  I  have 
certainly  found  most  curious  and  felicitous  passages  of 
comment  —  passages  which  extracted  a  brilliant  meaning 
from  numbers,  circumstances,  or  trivial  accidents,  appa- 
rently without  significance  or  object,  and  gave  to  things, 
without  a  place  or  a  habitation  in  the  critic's  regard,  a 
value  as  hieroglyphics  or  cryptical  ciphers,  which  struck 
me  as  elaborately  ingenious.  This  acknowledgment  I 
make  not  so  much  in  praise  of  Swedenborg,  whom  I  must 
still  continue  to  think  a  madman,  as  in  excuse  for  Mr. 
Clowes.  It  may  easily  be  supposed,  that  a  person  of  Mr. 
Clowes 's  consideration  and  authority,  was  not  regarded 
with  indifference  by  the  general  body  of  the  Swedenbor- 
gians.  At  his  motion  it  was,  I  believe,  that  a  society 
was  formed  for  procuring  and  encouraging  a  translation 
into  English,  of  Swedenborg's  entire  works,  most  of  which 
are  written  in  Latin.  Several  of  these  translations  are 
understood  to  have  been  executed  personally  by  Mr. 
Clowes ;  and  in  this  obscure  way,  for  anything  I  know. 
2 


18 


LITEKARY  B£MINISC£NC£S. 


he  may  have  been  an  extensive  author.  But  it  shows  the 
upright  character  of  the  man,  that  never,  in  one  instance, 
did  he  seek  to  bias  my  opinions  in  this  direction.  Upon 
every  other  subject,  he  trusted  me  confidentially  —  and, 
notwithstanding  my  boyish  years,  (15-  16,)  as  his  equal. 
His  regard  for  me,  when  thrown  by  accident  in  his  way, 
had  arisen  upon  his  notice  of  my  fervent  simplicity,  and, 
my  unusual  thoughtfulness.  Upon  these  merits,  I  had 
gained  the  honorable  distinction  of  a  general  invitation  to 
his  house,  without  exception  as  to  days  and  hours,  when 
few  others  could  boast  of  any  admission  at  all.  The 
common  ground  on  which  we  met  was  literature  —  more 
especially  the  Greek  and  Roman  literature  ;  and  much  he 
exerted  himself,  in  a  spirit  of  the  purest  courtesy,  to  meet 
my  animation  upon  these  themes.  But  the  interest  on  his 
part  was  too  evidently  a  secondary  interest  in  me,  for 
whom  he  talked,  and  not  in  the  subject :  he  spoke  much 
from  memory,  as  it  were  of  things  that  he  had  once  felt, 
and  little  from  immediate  sympathy  with  the  author ;  and 
his  animation  was  artificial,  though  his  courtesy,  which 
prompted  the  effort,  was  the  truest  and  most  unaffected 
possible. 

The  connection  between  us  must  have  been  interesting 
to  an  observer  ;  for,  though  I  cannot  say  with  Wordsworth, 
of  old  Daniel  and  his  grandson,  that  there  were  '  ninety 
good  years  of  fair  and  foul  weather '  between  us,  there 
were,  however,  sixty,  I  imagine,  at  the  least ;  whilst  as  a 
bond  of  connection,  there  was  nothing  at  all  that  I  know 
of  beyond  a  common  tendency  to  reverie,  which  is  a  bad 
link  for  a  social  connection.  The  little  ardor,  meantime, 
with  which  he  had,  for  many  years,  participated  in  the 
interests  of  this  world,  or  all  that  it  inherits,  was  now  rap- 
idly departing.  Daily  and  consciously  he  was  loosening 
m  ties  which  bound  him  to  earlier  recollections  ;  and. 


LITERAIIY  NOVITIATK. 


19 


in  particular,  I  remember  —  because  the  instance  was 
connected  with  my  last  farewell  visit  as  it  proved  —  that 
for  some  time  he  was  engaged  daily  in  renouncing  with 
solemnity,  (though  often  enough  in  cheerful  words,)  book 
after  book  of  classical  literature,  in  which  he  had  once 
taken  particular  delight.  Several  of  these,  after  taking 
his  final  glance  at  a  few  passages  to  which  a  pencil  refer- 
ence in  the  margin  pointed  his  eye,  he  delivered  to  me  as 
memorials  in  time  to  come  of  himself.  The  last  of  the 
books  given  to  me  under  these  circumstances,  was  a  Greek 
'  Odyssey,'  in  Clarke's  edition.  '  This,'  said  he, '  is  nearly 
the  sole  book  remaining  to  me  of  my  classical  library  — 
which,  for  some  years,  I  have  been  dispersing  amongst 
my  friends.  Homer  I  retained  to  the  last,  and  the 
*'  Odyssey,''  by  preference  to  the  "  Iliad,"  both  in  compli- 
ance with  my  own  taste,  and  because  this  very  copy  was 
my  chosen  companion  for  evening  amusement,  during  my 
freshman's  term  at  Trinity  College,  Cambridge  —  whither 
I  went  early  in  the  spring  of  1743.  Your  own  favorite 
Grecian  is  Euripides ;  but  still  you  must  value  —  we  must 
all  value  —  Homer.  I,  even  as  old  as  I  am,  could  still 
read  him  with  delight ;  and  as  long  as  any  merely  human 
composition  ought  to  occupy  my  time,  I  should  have  made 
an  exception  in  behalf  of  this  solitary  author.  But  I  am 
a  soldier  of  Christ ;  the  enemy,  the  last  enemy,  cannot  be 
far  off;  sarcinas  coUigere  is,  at  my  age,  the  watchword 
for  every  faithful  sentinel,  hourly  to  keep  watch  and  ward, 
to  wait  and  to  be  vigilant.  This  very  day,  I  have  taken 
my  farewell  glance  at  Homer,  for  I  must  no  more  be  found 
seeking  my  pleasure  amongst  the  works  of  man  ;  and,  that 
1  may  not  be  tempted  to  break  my  resolution,  I  make  over 
this  my  last  book  to  you.' 

Words  to  this  effect,  uttered  with  his  usual  solemnity, 
accompanied  his  gift  ;  and,  at  the  same  time,  he  added. 


20 


LITERABY  EEMINISCENCES. 


without  any  separate  comment,  a  little  pocket  Virgil  — 
the  one  edited  by  Alexander  Cunningham,  the  bitter  an- 
tagonist of  Bentley  —  with  a  few  annotations  placed  at 
the  end.  The  act  was  in  itself  a  solemn  one ;  something 
like  taking  the  veil  for  &  nun  —  a  final  abjuration  of  the 
world's  giddy  agitations.  And  yet  to  him  —  already  and 
for  so  long  a  time  linked  so  feebly  to  anything  that  could 
be  called  the  world,  and  living  in  a  seclusion  so  profound 
—  it  was  but  as  if  an  anchorite  should  retire  from  his  outer 
to  his  inner  cell.  Me,  however,  it  impressed  powerfully  in 
after  years  ;  because  this  act  of  self-dedication  to  the  next 
world,  and  of  parting  from  the  intellectual  luxuries  of  this, 
was  also,  in  fact,  though  neither  of  us  at  the  time  knew  it 
to  be  such,  the  scene  of  his  final  parting  with  myself. 
Immediately  after  his  solemn  speech,  on  presenting  me 
with  the  '  Odyssey,'  he  sat  down  to  the  organ,  sang  a 
hymn  or  two,  then  chanted  part  of  the  liturgy,  and, 
finally,  at  my  request,  performed  the  anthem  so  well 
known  in  the  English  Church  service  —  the  collect  for  the 
seventh  Sunday  after  Trinity  —  {Lord  of  all  power  and 
might,  ^c)  It  was  summer — about  half  after  nine  in 
the  evening  ;  the  light  of  day  was  still  lingering,  and  just 
strong  enough  to  illuminate  the  Crucifixion,  the  Stoning 
of  the  Proto-martyr,  and  other  grand  emblazonries  of  the 
Christian  faith,  which  adorned  the  rich  windows  of  his 
library.  Knowing  the  early  hours  of  his  household,  I 
now  received  his  usual  fervent  adieus  —  which,  without 
the  words,  had  the  sound  and  efifect  of  a  benediction  — 
felt  the  warm  pressure  of  his  hand,  saw  dimly  the  outline 
of  his  veneiable  figure,  more  dimly  his  saintly  counte- 
nance, and  quitted  that  gracious  presence,  which,  in  this 
world,  I  was  destined  no  more  to  revisit.  The  night  waa 
one  in  the  first  half  of  July,  1802  ;  in  the  second  half  of 
whi(  h,  or  very  early  in  August,  I  quitted  school  clande©. 


LITEKABY  NOVITIATE. 


Unely,  and  consequently  the  neighborhood  of  Mr.  Clowes , 
Some  years  after,  I  saw  his  death  announced  in  all  the 
public  journals,  as  having  occurred  at  Leamington  Spa, 
then  in  the  springtime  of  its  medicinal  reputation.  Fare- 
well, early  friend  !  holiest  of  men  whom  it  has  been  my 
lot  to  meet !  Yes,  I  repeat,  thirty-five  years  are  past 
since  then,  and  I  have  yet  seen  few  men  approaching  to 
this  venerable  clergyman  in  paternal  benignity  —  none 
certainly  in  child-like  purity,  apostolic  holiness,  or  in  per- 
fect alienation  of  heart  from  the  spirit  of  this  fleshly 
world. 

I  have  delineated  the  habits  and  character  of  Mr.  Clowes 
at  some  length,  chiefly  because  a  connection  is  rare  and 
interesting  between  parties  so  widely  asunder  in  point  of 
age  —  one  a  schoolboy,  and  the  other  almost  an  octoge- 
narian :  to  quote  a  stanza  from  one  of  the  most  spiritual 
sketches  of  Wordsworth  — 

•  We  talked  with  open  heart  and  tongue. 
Affectionate  and  free  — 
A  pair  of  friends,  though  I  was  young. 
And  Matthew  seventy-three.' 

I  have  stated  a  second  reason  for  this  record,  in  the 
fact  that  Mr.  Clowes  was  the  first  of  my  friends  who  had 
any  connection  with  the  press.  At  one  time  I  have 
reason  to  believe  that  this  connection  was  pretty  exten- 
sive, though  not  publicly  avowed ;  and  so  far  from  being 
lucrative,  that  at  first  I  believe  it  to  have  been  expensive 
to  him  ;  and  whatever  profits  might  afterwards  arise,  were 
applied,  as  much  of  his  regular  income,  to  the  benefit  of 
others.  Here,  again,  it  seems  surprising  that  a  spirit  so 
beneficent  and,  in  the  amplest  sense,  charitable,  could 
coalesce  in  any  views  with  Swedenborg,  who,  in  some 
senses,  was  not  charitable.  Swedenborg  had  been  scan- 
dalized by  a  notion  which,  it  seems,  he  found  prevalent 


22 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


amongst  the  poor  of  the  Continent -—viz.,  that,  if  richei 
were  a  drag  and  a  negative  force  on  the  road  to  religious 
perfection,  poverty  must  be  positive  title  per  se,  to  the 
favor  of  Heaven.  Grievously  offended  with  this  error, 
he  came  almost  to  hate  poverty  as  a  presumptive  indica- 
tion of  this  offensive  heresy ;  scarcely  would  he  allow  it 
an  indirect  value,  as  removing  in  many  cases  the  occa- 
sions or  incitements  of  evil.  No  :  being  in  itself  neutral 
and  indifferent,  he  argued  that  it  had  become  erroneously 
a  ground  of  presumptuous  hope;  whilst  the  rich  man, 
aware  of  his  danger,  was,  in  some  degree,  armed  against 
it  by  fear  and  humility.  And,  in  this  course  of  arguing 
and  of  corresponding  feeling,  Mr.  Swedenborg  had  come 
to  hate  the  very  name  of  a  poor  candidate  for  Heaven,  as 
bitterly  as  a  sharking  attorney  hates  the  applications  of  a 
pauper  ^client.  Yet  so  entirely  is  it  true,  that  '  to  the 
^ure,  all  things  are  pure,'  and  that  perfect  charity  '  think- 
eth  no  ill,'  but  is  gifted  with  a  powpr  to  transmute  all 
things  into  its  own  resemblance  —  so  entirely  is  all  this 
true,  that  this  most  spiritual,  and,  as  it  were,  disembodied 
of  men,  could  find  delight  in  the  dreams  of  the  very 
'  fleshliest  incubus  '  that  has  intruded  amongst  heavenly 
objects;  and,  secondly,  this  benignest  of  men  found  his 
own  pure  feelings  not  outraged  by  one  who  threw  a 
withering  scowl  over  the  far  larger  half  of  his  fellow- 
jreatures. 

Concurrently  with  this  acquaintance,  so  impressive  and 
so  elevating  to  me,  from  the  unusual  sanctity  of  Mr. 
Clowes's  character,  I  formed  another  with  a  well-known 
coterie,  more  avowedly,  and  in  a  more  general  sense, 
literary,  resident  at  Liverpool  or  its  neighborhood.  In 
my  sixteenth  year,  I  had  accompanied  my  mother  and 
family  on  a  summer's  excursion  to  Everton,  a  well-known 
village  upon  the  1:  eights  immediately  above  Liverpool , 


LITERARY  NOVITIATB. 


23 


though  by  this  time  I  believe  it  has  thrown  out  so  many 
fibres  of  connection,  as  to  have  become  a  mere  quarter  or 
suburban  '  process,'  (to  speak  by  anatomical  phrase,)  of 
the  great  town  below  it.  In  those  days,  however,  distant 
by  one  third  of  a  century  from  ours,  Everton  was  still  a 
distinct  village,  (for  a  mile  of  ascent  is  worth  three  of 
level  ground,  in  the  way  of  effectual  separation  ;)  it  was 
delightfully  refreshed  by  marine  breezes,  though  raised 
above  the  sea  so  far,  that  its  thunders  could  be  heard  only 
under  favorable  circumstances.  There  we  had  a  cottage 
for  some  months  ;  and  the  nearest  of  our  neighbors  hap- 
pened to  be  that  Mr.  Clarke  the  banker,  to  whom  ac- 
Knowledgments  are  made  in  the  Lorenzo  the  Magnificent^ 
for  aid  in  procuring  MSS.  and  information  from  Italy. 
This  gentleman  called  on  my  mother,  merely  in  the 
general  view  of  offering  neighborly  attentions  to  a  family 
of  strangers.  I,  as  the  eldest  of  my  brothers,  and  already 
with  strong  literary  propensities,  had  received  a  general 
invitation  to  his  house.  Thither  I  went,  indeed,  early 
and  late ;  and  there  I  met  Mr.  Roscoe,  Dr.  Currie,  (who 
had  just  at  that  time  published  his  Life  and  Edition  of 
Burns,)  and  Mr.  Shepherd  of  Gatacre,  the  author  of  some 
works  on  Italian  literature,  (particularly  a  Life  of  Poggio 
Bracciolini,)  and,  since  then,  well  known  to  all  England 
by  his  Reform  politics. 

There  were  other  members  of  this  society  —  some,  like 
myself,  visitors  merely  to  that  neighborhood ;  but  those  I 
have  mentioned  were  the  chief.  Here  I  had  an  early 
opportunity  of  observing  the  natural  character  and  ten- 
dencies of  merely  literary  society  —  by  which  society  I 
mean  all  such  as,  having  no  strong  distinctions  in  power 
of  thinking  or  in  native  force  of  cnaracter,  are  yet  raised 
into  circles  of  pretersion  and  mark,  by  the  fact  of  having 
written  a  book,  or  of  holding  a  notorious  connection  witb 


24 


LITEBARY  BEMINI8CENCES. 


some  department  or  other  of  the  periodical  press.  No 
society  is  so  vapid  and  uninteresting  in  its  natural  quality, 
Hone  so  cheerless  and  petrific  in  its  influence  upon  others. 
Ordinary  people,  in  such  company,  are  in  general  repress- 
ed from  uttering  with  cordiality  the  natural  expression  of 
their  own  minds  or  temperaments,  under  a  vague  feeling 
of  some  peculiar  homage  due,  or  at  least  customarily 
paid,  to  those  lions  :  such  people  are  no  longer  at  their 
ease,  or  masters  of  their  own  natural  motions  in  their  own 
natural  freedom  ;  whilst  indemnification  of  any  sort  is 
least  of  all  to  be  looked  for  from  the  literary  dons  who 
have  diffused  this  unpleasant  atmosphere  of  constraint. 
They  disable  others,  and  yet  do  nothing  themselves  to  fill 
up  the  void  they  have  created.  One  and  all  —  unless  by 
accident  people  of  unusual  originality,  power,  and  also 
nerve,  so  as  to  be  able  without  trepidation  to  face  the 
expectations  of  men  —  the  literary  class  labor  under  two 
opposite  disqualifications  for  a  good  tone  of  conversation. 
From  causes  visibly  explained,  they  are  either  spoiled  by 
the  vices  of  reserve,  and  of  over-consciousnesss  directed 
upon  themselves  —  this  is  one  extreme  ;  or,  where  manli- 
ness of  mind  has  prevented  this,  beyond  others  of  equal 
or  inferior  natural  power,  they  are  apt  to  be  desperately 
commonplace.  The  first  defect  is  an  accident  arising  out 
of  the  rarity  of  literary  pretensions  ;  and  would  rapidly 
subside  as  the  proportion  became  larger  of  practising  lite- 
rati to  the  mass  of  educated  people.  But  the  other  is  an 
adjunct  scarcely  separable  from  the  ordinary  prosecution 
of  a  literary  career,  and  growing  in  fact  out  of  literature 
per  56,  as  literature  is  generally  understood.  That  same 
day,  says  Homer,  which  makes  a  man  a  slave,  robs  him 
of  half  his  value.  That  same  hour  which  first  awakens  a 
child  to  the  consciousness  of  being  observed  and  to  the 
3ense  of  admiration,  strips  it  of  itt  freedom  and  unpre* 


LITEKARY  NOVITIATE. 


25 


meditated  graces  of  motion.  Awkwardness  at  the  least 
—  -  and  too  probably  as  a  consequence  of  that^  affectation 
and  conceit  —  follow  hard  upon  the  consciousness  of  spe- 
cial notice  or  admiration.  The  very  attempt  to  disguise 
embarrassment,  too  often  issues  in  a  secondary  and  more 
marked  embarrassment. 

Another  mode  of  reserve  arises  with  some  literary  men, 
who  believe  themselves  to  be  in  possession  of  novel  ideas. 
Cordiality  of  communication,  or  ardor  of  dispute,  might 
betray  them  into  a  revelation  of  those  golden  thoughts, 
sometimes  into  a  necessity  of  revealing  them,  since,  with- 
out such  aid,  it  might  be  impossible  to  maintain  theirs  in 
the  discussion.  On  this  principle  it  was  —  a  principle  of 
deliberate  unsocial  reserve  —  that  Adam  Smith  is  said  to 
have  governed  his  conversation  ;  he  ♦professed  to  put  a 
bridle  on  his  words,  lest  by  accident  a  pearl  should  drop 
out  of  his  lips  amongst  the  vigilant  bystanders.  And  in 
no  case  would  he  have  allowed  himself  to  be  engaged  in 
a  disputation,  because  both  the  passions  of  dispute  and  the 
necessities  of  dispute  are  alike  apt  to  throw  men  off  their 
guard.  A  most  unamiable  reason  it  certainly  is,  which 
places  a  man  in  one  constant  attitude  of  self-protection 
against  petty  larceny.  And  yet,  humiliating  as  that  may 
be  to  human  nature,  the  furtive  propensities  or  instincts 
of  petty  larceny  are  diffused  most  extensively  through  all 
ranks  —  directed,  too,  upon  a  sort  of  property  far  more 
tangible  and  more  ignoble  as  respects  the  possible  motives 
of  the  purloiner,  than  any  property  in  subjects  purely 
intellectual.  Rather  more  than  ten  years  ago,  a  literary 
man  of  the  name  of  Alton,  published,  some  little  time 
before  his  own  death,  a  very  searching  essay  upon  this 
chapter  of  human  integrity  —  arraying  a  large  list  of 
common  cases,  (cases  of  hats,  gloves,  umbrellas,  books, 
newspapers,  &c.)  where  the  claim  of  ownership,  left  tc 


26 


LITERAKY  BEMINISCENCES. 


itself  and  unsupported  by  accidents  of  shame  and  expo- 
Bure,  appeared  to  be  weak  indeed  amongst  classes  of 
society  prescriptively  '  respectable/  And  yet,  for  a  dou- 
ble reason,  literary  larceny  is  even  more  to  be  feared  , 
both  because  it  is  countenanced  by  a  less  ignoble  quality 
of  temptation,  and  because  it  is  far  more  easy  of  achieve- 
ment —  so  easy,  indeed,  that  it  may  be  practised  without 
any  clear  accompanying  consciousness. 

I  have  myself  witnessed  or  been,  a  party  to  a  case  of 
the  following  kind  :  —  A  new  truth  —  suppose  for  ex- 
ample, a  new  doctrine  or  a  new  theory  —  was  communi- 
cated to  a  very  able  man  in  the  course  of  conversation, 
not  didactically,  or  directly  as  a  new  truth,  but  polemically 
communicated  as  an  argument  in  the  current  of  a  dispute. 
What  followed  ?  Necessarily  it  followed  that  a  very  able 
man  would  not  be  purely  passive  in  receiving  this  new 
truth  ;  that  he  would  co-operate  with  the  communicator  in 
many  ways  —  as  by  raising  objections,  by  half  dissipating 
his  own  objections,  and  in  a  variety  of  other  co-agencies. 
In  such  cases,  a  very  clever  man  does  in  effect  half- 
generate  the  new  idea  for  himself,  but  then  he  does  this 
entirely  under  your  leading  ;  you  stand  ready  at  each 
point  of  possible  deviation,  to  warn  him  away  from  the 
wrong  turn  —  from  the  turn  which  leads  nowhither  or  the 
turn  which  leads  astray.  Yet  the  final  result  has  been, 
that  the  catechumen,  under  the  full  consciousness  of  self- 
exertion,  has  so  far  confounded  his  just  and  true  belief  of 
having  contributed  to  the  evolution  of  the  doctrine  quoad 
his  own  apprehension  of  it,  with  the  far  different  case  of 
having  evolved  the  trutL  itself  into  light,  as  to  go  off  with 
the  firm  impression  that  the  doctrine  had  been  a  product 
jf  his  own.  There  is  therefore  ground  enough  for  the 
jealousy  of  Adam  Smith,  since  a  robbery  may  be  com- 
mitted unconsciously ;  though,  by  the  way,  it  is  not  a 


LITEBABY  JN'OVITIATK. 


27 


peril  peculiarly  applicable  to  himself,  who  has  not  so 
much  succeeded  in  discovering  new  truths  as  in  establish- 
ing a  logical  connection  amongst  old  ones. 

On  the  other  hand,  it  is  not  by  reserve,  whether  of  affec- 
tation or  of  Smithian  jealousy,  that  the  majority  of  literary 
people  offend  —  at  least  not  by  the  latter  ;  for,  so  far  from 
having  much  novelty  to  protect  against  pirates,  the  most 
general  effect  of  literary  pursuits  is  to  tame  down  all 
points  of  originality  to  one  standard  of  insipid  monotony. 
I  shall  not  go  into  the  reasons  for  this.  I  make  my  appeal 
to  the  matter  of  fact.  Try  a  Parisian  populace,  very 
many  of  whom  are  highly  cultivated  by  reading,  against 
a  body  of  illiterate  rustics.  Mr.  Scott  of  Aberdeen,  in  his 
'  Second  Tour  to  Paris,'  (1815,)  tells  us,  that  on  looking 
over  the  shoulder  of  poor  stall  women  selling  trifles  in  the 
street,  he  usually  found  them  reading  Voltaire,  Rousseau, 
or  even  (as  I  think  he  adds)  Montesquieu  ;  but,  notwith- 
standing the  polish  which  such  reading  both  presumes  as 
a  previous  condition  and  produces  as  a  natural  effect, 
yet  no  people  could  be  more  lifeless  in  their  minds,  or 
more  barren  of  observing  faculties  than  they ;  and  so  he 
describes  them.  Words  !  words !  nothing  but  words  !  On 
the  other  hand,  listen  to  the  conversation  of  a  few  scanda- 
lous village  dames  collected  at  a  tea-table.  Vulgar  as  the 
spirit  may  be  which  possesses  them,  and  not  seldom  ma- 
licious, still  how  full  of  animation  and  of  keen  perception 
it  will  generally  be  found,  and  of  a  learned  spirit  of  con- 
noisseurship  in  human  character,  by  comparison  with  the 
fade  generalities,  and  barren  recollections  of  mere  literati ! 

All  this  was  partially  illustrated  in  the  circle  to  which  I 
was  now  presented.  Mr.  Clarke  was  not  an  author,  and 
he  was  by  much  the  most  interesting  person  of  the  whole. 
He  had  travelled,  and,  particularly,  he  had  travelled  in 
Italy  —  then  an  aristocratic  distinction  ;  had  a  small,  but 


28 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


interesting  picture  gallery  ;  and,  at  this  time,  amused  him- 
self by  studying  Greek,  for  which  purpose  he  and  myself 
met  at  sunrise  every  morning  through  the  summer,  and 
read  -^schylus  together.  These  meetings,  at  which  we 
sometimes  had  the  company  of  any  stranger  who  might 
happen  to  be  an  amateur  in  Greek,  were  pleasant  enough 
to  my  schoolboy  vanity  —  placing  me  in  the  position  of 
teacher  and  guide,  to  men  old  enough  to  be  my  grand- 
fathers. But  the  dinner  parties,  at  which  the  literati 
sometimes  assembled  in  force,  were  far  from  being  equally 
amusing.  Mr.  Roscoe  was  simple  and  manly  in  his  de- 
meanor ;  but  there  was  the  feebleness  of  a  mere  helle- 
lettrist,  a  mere  man  of  virtu ^  in  the  style  of  his  sentiments 
on  most  subjects.  Yet  he  was  a  politician,  and  took  an 
ardent  interest  in  politics,  and  wrote  upon  politics  —  all 
which  are  facts  usually  presuming  some  vigor  of  mind. 
And  he  wrote,  moreover,  on  the  popular  side,  and  with  a 
boldness  which,  in  that  day,  when  such  politics  were  abso- 
lutely disreputable,  seemed  undeniably  to  argue  great 
moral  courage.  But  these  were  accidents  arising  out  of 
his  connection  with  the  Whig  party,  or  (to  speak  more 
accurately)  with  the  Opposition  party  in  Parliament ;  by 
whom  he  was  greatly  caressed.  Mr.  Fox,  the  Duchess  of 
Devonshire,  Mr.  Sheridan,  and  all  the  poioers  on  that  side 
the  question,  showed  him  the  most  marked  attention  in  a 
great  variety  of  forms  ;  and  this  it  was,  not  any  native 
propensity  for  such  speculations,  which  drove  him  into 
pamphleteering  upon  political  questions.  Mr.  Fox  (him- 
self the  very  feeblest  of  party  writers)  was  probably  sin- 
cere in  his  admiration  of  Mr.  Roscoe's  pamphlets  ;  and  did 
»eriously  think  him,  as  I  know  that  he  described  him  in 
private  letters,  an  antagonist  well  matched  against  Burke ; 
and  that  he  afterwards  became  in  form.  The  rest  of  the 
world  wondered  at  his  presumption,  or  at  his  gross  miscal- 


LITERARY  NOVITIATE. 


29 


fulauon  of  his  own  peculiar  powers.  An  eminent  person, 
in  after  years,  (about  1815,)  speaking  to  me  of  Mr.  llos- 
coe's  political  writings,  especially  those  which  had  con- 
nected his  name  with  Burke,  declared  that  he  always  felt 
of  him  in  that  relation,  not  so  much  as  of  a  feeble  man, 
but  absolutely  as  of  a  Sporus^  (that  was  his  very  expres- 
sion,) or  a  man  emasculated.  Right  or  wrong  in  his 
views,  he  showed  the  most  painful  defect  of  good  sense 
and  prudence,  in  confronting  his  own  understanding,  so 
plain  and  homely,  with  the  Machiavelian  Briareus  of  a 
hundred  arms  —  the  Titan  whom  he  found  in  Burke  ;  all 
the  advantages  of  a  living  antagonist  over  a  dead  one, 
could  not  compensate  odds  so  fearful  in  original  power. 

It  was  a  striking  illustration  of  the  impotence  of  mere 
literature  against  natural  power  and  mother  wit,  that  the 
only  man  who  was  considered  indispensable  in  these 
parties,  for  giving  life  and  impulse  to  their  vivacity,  was  a 
tailor  ;  and  not,  I  was  often  assured,  a  person  deriving  a 
designation  from  the  craft  of  those  whose  labors  he  sup- 
ported as  a  capitalist,  but  one  who  drew  his  own  honest 
daily  bread  from  his  own  honest  needle,  except  when  he 
laid  it  aside  for  the  benefit  of  drooping  literati,  who 
needed  to  be  watered  with  his  wit.  Wit,  perhaps,  in  a 
proper  sense,  he  had  not  —  it  was  rather  drollery,  and 
sometimes,  even  buffoonery.  These,  in  the  lamentable 
absence  of  the  tailor,  could  be  furnished  of  an  inferior 
quality  by  Mr.  Shepherd,  who  (as  may  be  imagined  from 
this  fact)  had  but  little  dignity  in  private  life.  I  know 
not  how  far  he  might  alter  in  these  respects ;  but  certainly, 
at  the  time,  (1801-2,)  he  was  decidedly  or  could  be  a 
buffoon  ;  and  seemed  even  ambitious  of  the  title,  by  court- 
ing notice  for  his  grotesque  manner  and  coarse  stories, 
more  than  was  altogether  compatible  with  the  preten- 
tions of  a  scholar  and  a  clergyman.    I  must  have  leave 


30 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


to  think  that  such  a  man  could  not  have  emerged  from 
any  great  university,  or  from  any  but  a  sectarian  training. 
Indeed,  about  Poggio  himself  there  were  circumstances 
which  would  have  indisposed  any  regular  clergyman  of 
the  Church  of  England  or  of  the  Scottish  Kirk,  to  usher 
him  into  the  literature  of  his  country.   With  what  coarse- 
Qess  and  low  buffoonery  have  I  heard  this  Mr.  Shepherd  in 
those  days  run  down  the  bishops  then  upon  the  bench, 
but  especially  those  of  any  public  pretensions  or  reputa- 
tion, as  Horsley  and  Porteus,  and,  in  connection  with 
them,  the  pious  Mrs.  Hannah  More  !    Her  he  could  not 
endure.  ......... 

Of  this  gentleman  having  said  something  disparaging,  I 
am  bound  to  go  on  and  add,  that  I  believe  him  to  have 
been  at  least  a  truly  upright  man  —  talking  often  wildly, 
but  incapable  of  doing  a  conscious  wrong  to  any  man,  be 
his  party  what  it  might ;  and,  in  the  midst  of  fun  or  even 
buffoonery,  a  real,  and,  upon  occasion,  a  stern  patriot. 
Mr.  Canning  and  others  he  opposed  to  the  teeth  upon  the 
Liverpool  hustings  ;  and  would  take  no  bribe,  as  others 
did,  from  literary  feelings  of  sympathy,  or  (which  is  so 
hard  for  an  amiable  mind  to  resist)  from  personal  applica- 
tions of  courtesy  and  respect.  Amusing  it  is  to  look 
back  upon  any  political  work  of  Mr.  Shepherd's,  as  upon 
ais  '  Tour  to  France'  in  1815,  and  to  know  that  the  pale 
pink  of  his  Radicalism  was  then  accounted  deep,  deep 
Karlet. 

Nothing  can  better  serve  to  expound  the  general  force 
of  intellect  amongst  the  Liverpool  coterie  than  the  quality 
of  their  poetry,  and  the  general  standard  which  they  set 
up  in  poetry.  Not  that  even  in  their  errors,  as  regarded 
poetry,  they  were  of  a  magnitude  to  establish  any 
standard  or  authority,  in  their  own  persons.  Imitable  oi 
seducing,  there  could  be  nothing  in  persons  who  wrote 


LITEBAKY  NOVITIATE. 


31 


erses  occasionally,  and  as  a  nuQtQyov  or  by-labor,  and 
were  tbemselves  ilie  most  timid  of  imitators.  But  to 
me^  who,  in  that  year,  1801,  already  knew  of  a  grand 
renovation  of  poetic  power  —  of  a  new  birth  in  poetry  , 
interesting  not  so  much  to  England  as  to  the  human 
mind  —  it  was  secretly  amusing  to  contrast  the  little 
artificial  usages  of  their  petty  traditional  knack,  with  the 
natural  forms  of  a  divine  art  —  the  difierence  being 
pretty  much  as  between  an  American  lake,  Ontario,  or 
Superior,  and  a  carp  pond  or  a  tench  preserve.  Mr. 
Roscoe  had  just  about  this  time  published  a  translation 
from  the  Balia  of  Luigi  Tansillo  —  a  series  of  dullish 
lines,  with  the  moral  purpose  of  persuading  young 
women  to  suckle  their  own  children.  The  brilliant 
young  Duchess  of  Devonshire,  some  half  century  ago, 
had,  for  a  frolic  —  a  great  lady's  caprice  —  set  a  prece- 
dent in  this  way ;  against  which,  however,  in  that  rank, 
medical  men  know  that  there  is  a  good  deal  to  be  said  ; 
and  in  ranks  more  extensive  than  those  of  the  Dachess,  it 
must  be  something  of  an  Irish  bull  to  suppose  uny  general 
neglect  of  this  duty,  since,  upon  so  large  a  scale,  whetx^KS 
could  come  the  vicarious  nurses  ?  There  is,  therefore, 
no  great  sense  in  the  fundamental  idea  of  the  poem, 
because  the  abuse  denounced  cannot  be  large  enough  ; 
but  the  prefatory  sonnet,  addressed  to  the  translator's 
wife,  as  one  at  whose  maternal  breast  '  six  son's  succes- 
eive '  had  hung  in  infancy  —  this  is  about  the  one  sole 
bold,  natural  thought,  or  natural  expression  of  feeling, 
to  which  Mr.  Roscoe  had  committed  himself  in  verse. 
Everywhere  eUe,  the  most  timid  and  blind  servility  to  the 
narrowest  of  conventional  usages,  conventional  ways  of 
viewing  things,  conventional  forms  of  expression,  marks 
ihe  style.  For  example,  Italy  is  always  Italia,  Scotland 
Scotitty  France  Gallia ;  so  inveterately  had  the  mind,  in 


32 


LITEKARY  REMINISCENCES. 


this  school  of  feeling,  been  trained,  alike  in  the  highest 
things  and  in  the  lowest,  to  a  horror  of  throwing  itself 
boldly  upon  the  great  realities  of  life :  even  names  must 
be  fictions  for  their  taste.  Yet  what  comparison  between 
'  France,  an  Ode,*  and  '  Gallia,  an  Ode  ? '  —  Dr.  Currio 
was  so  much  occupied  with  his  professional  duties,  that  of 
him  I  saw  but  little.  His  edition  of  Burns  was  just  then 
published,  (I  think  in  that  very  month,)  and  in  every- 
body's hands.  At  that  time,  he  was  considered  not  unjust 
to  the  memory  of  the  man,  and  (however  constitutionally 
phlegmatic,  or  with  little  enthusiasm,  at  least  in  external 
show)  not  much  below  the  mark  in  his  appreciation  of 
the  poet. 

So  stood  matters  some  twelve  or  fourteen  years ;  after 
which  period,  a  *  craze '  arose  on  the  subject  of  Burns, 
which  allowed  no  voice  to  be  heard  but  that  of  zealotry 
and  violent  partisanship.  The  first  impulse  to  this  arose 
out  of  an  oblique  collision  between  Lord  Jeffrey  and  Mr. 
Wordsworth  ;  the  former  having  written  a  disparaging 
critique  upon  Bums's  pretensions  —  a  little,  perhaps,  too 
much  colored  by  the  fastidiousness  of  long  practice  in  the 
world,  but,  in  the  main,  speaking  some  plain  truths  on  the 
quality  of  Burns's  understanding,  as  expressed  in  his 
epistolary  compositions.  Upon  which,  in  his  celebrated 
letter  to  Mr.  James  Gray,  the  friend  of  Burns,  himself  a 
poet,  and  then  a  master  in  the  High  School  of  Edin- 
burgh, Mr.  Wordsworth  commented  with  severity,  pro- 
portioned rather  to  his  personal  resentments  towards  Lord 
Jeffrey  than  to  the  quantity  of  wrong  inflicted  upon 
Burns.  Mr.  Wordsworth's  letter,  in  so  far  as  it  was  a 
record  of  embittered  feeling,  might  have  perished  ;  but, 
as  it  happened  to  embody  some  profound  criticisms, 
applied  to  the  art  of  biography,  and  especially  to  the 
delicate  task  of   following  a  man  of   original  genius 


L1TERA.RY  NOYITIATE. 


33 


through  his  personal  infirmities  or  his  constitutional  aber- 
rations —  this  fact,  and  its  relation  to  Burns  and  the 
author's  name,  have  all  combined  to  embalm  it.  Its 
momentary  effect,  in  conjunction  with  Lord  Jeffrey's 
article,  was  to  revive  the  interest  (which  for  some  time 
had  languished  under  the  oppression  of  Sir  Walter  Scott 
and  Lord  Byron)  in  all  that  related  to  Burns.  Fresh 
Lives  appeared  in  a  continued  succession,  until  upon  the 
death  of  Lord  Byron  in  1824,  Mr.  Allan  Cunningham, 
who  had  personally  known  Burns,  so  far  as  a  boy  could 
know  a  mature  man,  gave  a  new  impulse  to  the  interest, 
by  an  impressive  paper,  in  which  he  contrasted  the  cir- 
cumstances of  Burns' s  death  with  those  of  Lord  Byron's ; 
and  also  the  two  funerals  —  both  of  which,  one  altogether, 
and  the  other  in  part,  Mr.  Cunningham  had  personally 
witnessed.  A  man  of  genius,  like  Mr.  Cunningham, 
throws  a  new  quality  of  interest  upon  all  which  he 
touches  ;  and  having  since  brought  fresh  research  and  the 
illustrative  power  of  the  arts  to  bear  upon  the  subject, 
and  all  this  having  gone  on  concurrently  with  the  great 
modern  revolution  in  literature  —  that  is,  the  great  exten- 
sion of  a  popular  interest,  through  the  astonishing  reduc- 
tions of  price  —  the  result  is,  that  Burns  has,  at  length, 
become  a  national,  and,  therefore,  in  a  certain  sense,  a 
privileged  subject,  which,  in  a  perfect  sense,  he  was  not^ 
until  the  controversial  management  of  his  reputation  had 
Initated  the  public  attention.  Dr.  Currie  did  not  address 
the  same  alert  condition  of  the  public  feeling,  nor,  by 
many  hundred  degrees,  so  diffused  a  condition  of  any 
feeling  which  might  imperfectly  exist,  as  a  man  must 
consciously  address  in  these  days,  whether  as  the  biogra- 
pher or  the  critic  of  Burns.  The  lower-toned  enthusiasm 
of  the  public  was  not  of  a  quality  to  irritate  any  little  en- 
thusiasm which  the  worthy  Doctor  might  have  felt.  Tha 
8 


34 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


public  of  that  day  felt  with  regard  to  Burns  exactly  ai 
with  regard  to  Bloomfield  —  not  that  the  quality  of  his 
poems  was  then  the  staple  of  the  interest,  but  the  extra- 
ordinary fact  that  a  ploughman  or  a  lady's  shoemaker 
should  have  written  any  poems  at  all.  The  solo  differ- 
ence in  the  two  cases,  as  regarded  by  the  public  of  that 
day,  was,  that  Burns' s  case  was  terminated  by  a  prema- 
ture, and,  for  the  public,  a  very  sudden  death  :  this  gave 
a  personal  interest  to  his  case,  which  was  wanting  in  the 
other  ;  and  a  direct  result  of  this  was,  that  hig  executors 
were  able  to  lay  before  the  world  a  series  of  his  letters  re- 
cording his  opinions  upon  a  considerable  variety  of  authors, 
and  his  feelings  under  many  ordinary  occasions  of  life. 

Dr.  Currie,  therefore,  if  phlegmatic,  as  he  certainly 
was,  must  be  looked  upon  as  upon  a  level  with  the  public 
of  his  own  day  —  a  public  how  different,  different  by  how 
many  centuries,  from  the  world  of  this  present  1837! 
One  thing  I  remember  which  powerfully  illustrates  the 
difference.  Burns,  as  we  all  know,  with  his  peculiarly 
wild  and  almost  ferocious  spirit  of  independence,  came  a 
generation  too  soon.  In  this  day,  he  would  have  been 
forced  to  do  that,  clamorously  called  upon  to  do  that,  and 
would  have  found  his  pecuniary  interest  in  doing  that, 
which  in  his  own  generation  merely  to  attempt  doing, 
loaded  him  with  the  reproach  of  Jacobinism.  It  must  be 
remembered  that  the  society  of  Liverpool  wits,  on  whom 
my  retrospect  is  now  glancing,  were  all  Whigs  —  all, 
indeed,  fraternizers  with  French  republicanism.  Yet  so  it 
was,  that  —  not  once,  not  twice,  but  daily  almost,  in  the 
numerous  conversations  naturally  elicited  by  this  Liver- 
pool monument  to  Burns's  memory —  1  heard  every  one, 
clerk  or  layman,  heartily  agreeing  to  tax  Burns  with 
ingratitude  and  with  pride  falsely  directed,  because  he 
Bate  uneasily  or  restively  under  the  bridle-hand  of  his 


LTTERAKY  NOVITIATE. 


35 


Bioble  self- called  '  patrons,''  Aristocracy,  then  —  the 
essential  spirit  of  aristocracy  —  this  I  found  was  not  less 
erect  and  clamorous  amongst  partisan  democrats  — 
democrats  who  were  such  merely  in  a  party  sense  of 
supporting  his  Majesty's  Opposition  against  his  Majesty's 
servants  —  that  it  was  or  could  he  among  the  most 
bigoted  of  the  professed  feudal  aristocrats.  For  my  part, 
at  this  moment,  when  all  the  world  was  reading  Currie's 
monument  to  the  memory  of  Burns  and  the  support  of 
his  family,  I  felt  and  avowed  my  feeling  most  loudly 

—  that  Burns  was  wronged,  was  deeply,  memorably 
wronged.  A  £10  bank  note,  by  way  of  subscription  for 
a  few  copies  of  an  early  edition  of  his  poems  —  this  is  the 
outside  that  I  could  ever  see  proof  given  of  Burns  having 
received  anything  in  the  way  of  patronage ;  and  doubtless 
this  would  have  been  gladly  returned,  but  from  the  dire 
necessity  of  dissembling. 

Lord  Glencairn  is  the  '  patron '  for  whom  Burns  ap- 
pears to  have  felt  the  most  sincere  respect.    Yet  even  he 

—  did  he  give  him  more  than  a  seat  at  his  dinner  table  ? 
Lord  Buchan  again,  whose  liberalities  are  by  this  time 
pretty  well  appreciated  in  Scotland,  exhorts  Burns,  in  a 
tone  of  one  preaching  upon  a  primary  duty  of  life,  to 
exemplary  gratitude  towards  a  person  who  had  given  him 
absolutely  nothing  at  all.  The  man  has  not  yet  lived  to 
whose  happiness  it  was  more  essential  that  he  should  live 
unencumbered  by  the  sense  of  obligation  ;  and,  qn  the 
other  hand,  the  man  has  not  lived  upon  whose  independ- 
ence as  professing  benefactors  so  many  people  practised, 
or  who  found  so  many  others  ready  to  ratify  and  give 
value  to  their  pretences.^    Him.  whom  beyond  most 

*  Jacobinism  —  although  the  seminal  principle  of  all  political  evil 
in  ill  ages  alike  of  advanced  civilization  —  is  natural  to  the  heart  of 
man,  and,  in  a  (qualified  sense,  may  be  meritorious.    A  good  man,  a 


36 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


men,  nature  had  created  with  the  necessity  of  conscioi.1 
independence,  all  men  besieged  with  the  assurance  that 
he  was,  must  be,  ought  to  be  dependent ;  nay,  that  it  was 
his  primary  duty  to  be  grateful  for  his  dependence.  I 
have  not  looked  into  any  edition  of  Burns,  except  once 
for  a  quotation,  since  this  year  1801 — when  I  read  the 
whole  of  Currie's  edition,  and  had  opportunities  of  meet- 
ing the  editor  —  and  once  subsequently  upon  occasion  of 
a  fifth  or  supplementary  volume  being  published.  I  know 
not,  therefore,  how  this  matter  has  been  managed  by  suc- 
ceeding editors,  such  as  Allan  Cunningham,  far  more 
capable  of  understanding  Burns's  situation,  from  the  pre- 
vious struggles  of  their  own  honorable  lives,  and  Burns's 
feelings  from  something  of  congenial  power. 

I,  in  this  year,  1801,  when  in  the  company  of  Dr. 
Currie,  did  not  forget,  and,  with  some  pride  I  say  that  I 
stood  alone  in  remembering,  the  very  remarkable  position 
of  Burns  :  not  merely  that,  with  his  genius,  and  with  the 
intellectual  pretensions,  generally,  of  his  family,  he  should 
have  been  called  to  a  life  of  early  labor,  and  of  labor 

high-minded  man,  in  certain  circumstances,  must  be  a  Jacobin  in  a 
certain  sense.  The  aspect  under  which  Burns's  Jacobinism  appears 
is  striking  :  there  is  a  thought  which  an  observing  reader  will  find 
often  recurring,  which  expresses  its  peculiar  bitterness.  It  is  this  : 
the  necessity  which  in  old  countries  exists  for  the  laborer  humbly  to 
beg  permission  that  he  may  labor.  To  eat  in  the  sweat  of  a  man's 
brow  —  that  is  bad;  and  that  is  a  curse,  and  pronounced  such  by 
God.  But  when  that  is  all,  the  laborer  is  by  comparison  happy. 
The  second  curse  makes  that  a  jest :  he  must  sue,  he  must  sneak,  he 
must  fawn  like  an  Oriental  slave,  in  order  to  win  his  fellow-man,  in 
Burns's  indignant  words  :  —  *  To  give  him  leave  to  toil.'  That  was 
the  scorpion  thought  that  was  for  ever  shooting  its  sting  into  Burns's 
meditations,  whether  forward-looking  or  backward-looking;  and  that 
considered,  there  arises  a  world  of  allowance  for  that  vulgar  bluster 
of  independence  which  Lord  JeiBfrey,  with  so  much  apparent  reason, 
'harges  upon  his  prose  writings. 


LITERARY  NOYITIATE. 


37 


anhappily  not  prosperous,  but  also  that  he,  by  accident 
about  the  proudest  of  human  spirits,  should  have  been  by 
accident  summoned,  beyond  all  others,  to  eternal  recog- 
nitions of  some  mysterious  gratitude,  which  he  owed  to 
some  mysterious  patrons  little  and  great,  whilst  yet  of  all 
men,  perhaps,  he  reaped  the  least  obvious  or  known  benefit 
from  any  patronage  that  has  ever  been  put  on  record. 
Most  men,  if  they  reap  little  from  patronage,  are  liberated 
from  the  claims  of  patronage  ;  or  if  they  are  summoned 
to  a  galling  dependency,  have  at  least  the  fruits  of  their 
dependency.  But  it  was  this  man's  unhappy  fate  —  with 
an  early  and  previous  irritability  on  this  very  point  —  to 
find  himself  saddled,  by  his  literary  correspondents,  with 
all  that  was  odious  in  dependency,  whilst  he  had  every 
hardship  to  face  that  is  most  painful  in  unbefriended 
poverty. 

On  this  view  of  the  case,  I  talked,  then,  being  a  school- 
boy, with  and  against  the  first  editor  of  Burns  :  I  did  not, 
and  I  do  not,  profess  to  admire  the  letters,  (that  is,  the 
prose,)  all  or  any,  of  Burns.  I  felt  that  they  were  liable 
to  the  charges  of  Lord  J efFrey,  and  to  others  beside  ;  that 
they  do  not  even  express  the  natural  vigor  of  Burns' s 
mind,  but  are  at  once  vulgar,  tawdry,  coarse,  and  com- 
monplace ;  neither  was  I  a  person  to  afibct  any  profound 
sympathy  with  the  general  character  and  temperament  of 
Burns,  which  has  often  been  described  as  *  of  the  earth, 
earthy  '  —  unspiritual  —  animal  —  beyond  those  of  most 
men  equally  intellectual.  But  still  I  comprehended  his 
situation  ;  I  had  for  ever  ringing  in  my  ears,  during  that 
summer  of  1801,  those  groans  which  ascended  to  heaven 
from  his  over-burthened  heart  —  those  harrowing  words. 
To  give  him  leave  to  toil^*  which  record  almost  a  re- 
proach to  the  ordinances  of  God  —  and  I  felt  that  upon 
Vim,  amongst  all  the  children  of  labor,  the  primal  cuise 


38 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


had  fallen  heaviest  and  sunk  deepest.  Feelings  such  as 
these  I  had  the  courage  to  express  :  a  personal  compli- 
ment, or  so,  I  might  now  and  then  hear ;  hut  all  were 
against  me  on  the  matter.  Dr.  Currie  said  — '  Poor 
Burns  !  such  notions  had  heen  his  ruin ; '  Mr.  Shepherd 
continued  to  draw  from  the  subject  some  scoff  or  growl  at 
Mr.  Pitt  and  the  Excise ;  the  laughing  tailor  told  us  a  good 
story  of  some  proud  beggar ;  Mr.  Clarke  proposed  that  I 
should  write  a  Greek  inscription  for  a  cenotaph  which  he 
was  to  erect  in  his  garden  to  the  memory  of  Burns  ;  — 
and  so  passed  away  the  solitary  protestation  on  behalf  of 
Burns's  jacobinism,  together  with  the  wine  and  the  roses, 
and  the  sea-breezes  of  that  same  Everton,  in  that  same 
summer  of  1801.  Mr.  Roscoe  is  dead,  and  has  found 
time  since  then  to  be  half  forgotten  ;  Dr.  Currie,  the  phy- 
sician, has  been  found  '  unable  to  heal  himself ;  '  Mr. 
Shepherd  of  Gatacre  is  a  name  and  a  shadow;  Mr.  Clarke 
is  a  shadow  without  a  name  ;  the  tailor,  who  set  the  table 
in  a  roar,  is  dust  and  ashes  ;  and  three  men  at  the  most 
remain  of  all  who,  in  those  convivial  meetings,  held  it 
right  to  look  down  upon  Burns  as  upon  one  whose  spirit 
was  rebellious  overmuch  against  the  institutions  of  man, 
and  jacobinical  in  a  sense  which  '  men  of  property '  and 
master  manufacturers  will  never  brook,  albeit  democrats 
by  profession. 

So  passed  my  novitiate  as  a  literary  aspirant,  and  in 
circles  such  as  these.  The  next  persons  of  eminence 
whom  I  saw  were,  with  few  exceptions,  in  the  circles  of 
London  ;  and  these  were  Sir  Humphry  Davy,  Professor 
Wilson,  Mr.  Godwin,  Mrs.  Siddons,  Lady  Hamilton,  Mrs. 
Hannah  More  and  her  sisters.  Walking  Stewart,  Dr.  Bed- 
does,  Mr.  Abernethy,  Charles  Lamb,  Mr.  Hazlitt,  Dr.  Parr, 
and  others  of  whom  I  should  say  a  passing  word  or  two 
according  to  the  circumstances,  slight  or  ample,  under 
^hich  I  saw  them. 


SIB  HUMPHKl  DATY. 


39 


CHAPTER  II. 

glR  HUMPHRY  DAVY -~  MR.  GODWIN  — MRS.  GRANT. 

Sib  Humphby  Davy,  of  all  those  whom  I  haye  just 
mentioned  —  nay,  of  all  the  eminent  persons  whom  I 
have  ever  seen  even  by  a  casual  glimpse  —  was  the  most 
agreeable  to  Itnow  on  the  terms  of  a  slight  acquaintance. 
What  he  might  have  proved  upon  a  closer  intimacy,  I  can- 
not say  ;  not  having  had  the  honor  of  any  such  connection 
with  him.  My  acquaintance  had  never  gone  far  enough 
to  pass  the  barrier  of  stranger  ship,  and  the  protection 
which  lies  in  that  consciousness,  reciprocally  felt ;  for,  if 
friendship  and  confidential  intimacy  have  the  power  to 
confer  privileges,  there  are  other  privileges  which  they 
take  away ;  and  many  times  it  is  better  to  be  privileged 
as  the  '  stranger '  of  a  family  than  as  its  friend.  Some 
I  have  known  who,  therefore,  only  called  a  man  their 
friend,  that  they  might  have  a  license  for  taking  liberties 
with  him.  Sir  Humphry,  I  have  no  reason  to  believe, 
would  have  altered  for  the  worse  on  a  closer  connection. 
But  for  myself  I  know  him  only  within  ceremonious 
bounds  ;  and  I  must  say  that  nowhere,  before  or  since, 
have  I  seen  a  man  who  had  so  felicitously  caught  the 
"ascinating  tone  of  high-bred  urbanity  which  distinguishes 
ihe  best  part  of  the  British  nobility.  The  first  time  of  my 
Beeing  him  was  at  the  Courier  office,  in  a  drawing-room 
\hen  occupied  by  Mr.  Coleridge,  and  as  a  guest  of  that 


40 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


gentleman:  this  must  have  been  either  in  1808  or  1809 
Sir  Humphry  (I  forget  whether  then  a  baronet,  but  I  thinh 
not)  had  promised  to  drink  tea  with  Mr.  Coleridge,  on  his 
road  to  a  meeting  of  the  Royal  Society  ;  before  which 
learned  body  he  was  on  that  evening  to  read  some  paper 
or  other  of  his  own  composition.  I  had  the  honor  to  be 
invited  as  sole  '  respondent '  to  the  learned  philosopher  ; 
sole  supporter  of  the  antisthrope  in  our  choral  perform- 
ance. It  sounded  rather  appalling  to  be  engaged  in  a  glee 
for  three  voices,  with  two  performers  such  as  these  ;  and  I 
trepidated  a  little  as  I  went  up  stairs,  having  previously 
understood  that  the  great  man  was  already  come.  The 
door  was  thrown  open  by  the  servant  who  announced  me ; 
and  I  saw  at  once,  in  full  proportions  before  me,  the  full- 
length  figure  of  the  young  savant^  not,  perhaps  above  ten 
years  older  than  myself,  whose  name  already  filled  all  the 
post-horns  of  Europe,  and  levied  homage  from  Napoleon. 
He  was  a  little  below  the  middle  height ;  agreeable  in  his 
person,  and  amiable  in  the  expression  of  his  countenance. 
His  dress  was  elaborately  accurate  and  fashionable  —  no 
traces  of  soot  or  furnace  there ;  it  might  be  said,  also, 
that  it  was  youthful  and  almost  gay  in  its  character.  But 
what  chiefly  distinguished  him  from  other  men,  was  the 
captivating  —  one  might  call  it  the  radiant  —  courtesy  of 
his  manner.  \l  was  at  once  animated,  and  chastised  by 
good-breeding  ,  graceful,  and,  at  the  same  time,  gracious. 

From  a  person  so  eminent  it  would  not  have  been  a 
suflicient  encouragement  that  his  manner  should  be,  in  a 
passive  sense,  courteous.  This  would  have  expressed 
only  a  consciousness  of  what  was  due  to  himself.  But 
Sir  Humphry's  manner  was  conciliatory  and  intentionally 
winning.  To  a  person  as  obscure  as  myself,  it  held  out 
the  flattering  expressions  of  a  wish  to  recommend  him- 
lelf,  an  assurance  of  interest  in  your  person,  and  a  desire 


SIR  HUMPHRY  DATT. 


41 


both  to  know  and  to  be  known.  In  such  expressions  of 
feeling,  when  they  are  borne  upon  the  very  surface  of  the 
manners,  and  scattered  like  sunbeams  indiscriminately 
upon  all  who  fall  within  their  range,  doubtless  there  must 
be  something  of  artifice  and  a  polished  hypocrisy.  And 
nobody  can  more  readily  acknowledge  than  myself  the 
integrity  which  lies  at  the  bottom  of  our  insular  reserve 
and  moroseuess.  Two  sound  qualities  are  at  the  root  of 
these  unpleasant  phenomena — modesty  or  unpresuming- 
ness  in  the  first  place,  and  sincerity  in  the  second.  To  be 
impudent  was  so  much  of  the  essence  of  profligacy  in  the 
ideas  of  the  ancients,  that  the  one  became  the  most  ordi- 
nary expression  *  for  the  other ;  and  sincerity,  again,  or 
directness  of  purpose,  is  so  much  of  the  essence  of  con- 
scientiousness, that  we  take  obliquity  or  crookedness  for 
one  way  of  expounding  dishonesty  or  depravity  of  the 
moral  sense  —  and,  according  to  their  natural  tendencies, 
no  doubt  this  is  true.  But  such  things  admit  of  many 
modifications.   Without  absolute  dissimulation,  it  is  allow- 

*  Yiz.  in  the  word  improhus.  But  so  defective  are  all  dictionaries, 
that  there  is  some  difficulty  in  convincing  scholars  that  the  leading 
idea  of  improhiSj  its  sole  original  idea  is  —  impudence,  boldness,  or 
audacity.  Great  is  the  incoherency  and  absurdity  of  learned  men  in 
questions  of  philology.  Thus  Hayne,  in  a  vain  attempt  to  make  out 
(consistently  to  make  out)  the  well  known  words,  '  labor  improhus 
omnia  vincit,'  says,  that  improhus  means  pertinax.  How  so  ?  /m- 
probus  originally  always  has  the  meaning  of  audacious.  Thus  Pliny, 
speaking  of  the  first  catalogue  of  stars  made  by  Hipparchus,  calls 
it  —  *  labor  itiam  Deo  improhus'  —  an  enterprise  audacious  even 
for  a  superhuman  being.  Here  is  the  very  same  word  labor  again 
qualified  by  the  same  epithet.  And  five  hundred  other  cases  might 
6e  adduced  in  which  the  sense  of  audacity,  and  that  only,  will  un- 
lock all,  as  by  a  master-key.  Salmasius  fancied  (see  his  De  Pallia 
of  Tertullian)  that  the  true  idea  was  the  excessive  or  enormous-^ 
iv^hatever  violated  the  common  standards  in  any  mode  of  dispro- 
portion. 


42 


JCITERARY  REMINISCENCES 


able  and  even  laudable  to  reject,  by  a  second  or  amended 
impulse,  what  the  first  involuntary  impulse  would  have 
prompted ;  and  to  practise  so  much  disguise  as  may  with- 
draw from  too  open  notice  the  natural  play  of  human  feel- 
ings. By  what  right  does  a  man  display  to  another,  in 
his  very  look  of  alienation  and  repulsion  at  his  first  intro- 
duction, that  he  dislikes  him,  or  that  he  is  doubtful  whether 
he  shall  like  him  ?  Yet  this  is  the  too  general  movement 
of  British  sincerity.  The  play  of  feelings,  the  very 
flux  and  reflux  of  contending  emotions,  passes  too  nakedly 
in  the  very  act  and  process  of  introduction,  under  the  eyes 
of  the  party  interested.  Frankness  is  good,  honesty  is 
good ;  but  not  a  frankness,  not  an  honesty  which  counter- 
licts  the  very  purposes  of  social  meetings  —  for,  unless 
he  comes  with  the  purpose  of  being  pleased,  why  does  a 
man  come  at  all  into  meetings,  not  of  business  or  neces- 
sity, but  of  relaxation  and  social  pleasure  ? 

From  Sir  H.  Davy's  conversation,-  which  he  carefully 
turned  aside  from  his  professional  knowledge,  nothing  of 
importance  was  to  be  collected ;  he  did  not  mean  that 
there  should.  He  meant  to  be  a  French  talker  —  light, 
glancing,  sparkling ;  and  he  was  so.  Upon  the  first  oc- 
casion of  my  seeing  him,  I  remember  that  he  supported 
the  peculiarly  shallow  hypothesis,  that  climate  was  the 
great  operating  cause  in  determining  national  diflerences 
of  all  kinds  —  in  the  arts  as  well  as  in  civil  institutions. 
Apparently  he  did  this  with  malice  prepense^  as  a  means 
of  exciting  Mr.  Coleridge  to  talk,  by  the  provocation  of 
shallowness.  But  he  fought  imparihus  armis  against  Coler- 
idge :  the  great  boa  constrictor  could  not  be  roused  into 
unfolding  his  coils  ;  the  monster  was  lethargic  on  this 
evening,  as  if  he  had  recently  swallowed  a  herd  of  goats 
and  their  horns.  The  fact  was,  as  I  afterwards  found 
that  Coleridge  did  not  like  the  brilliant  manipulator  and 


SIR  HUMPHRY  DAYY. 


43 


lecturer.  Coleridge  thought  him  effeminate,  and  (like 
many  others  at  that  time)  ridiculed  his  lecturing  '  in  white 
kid  gloves/  and  adapting  his  experiments  —  that  is,  his 
public  experiments  at  the  Royal  Institution  —  to  the  shal- 
low and  trivial  taste  of  mere  amateurs,  who  happened  to 
be  in  powerful  stations.  Still  more,  he  complained  of 
what  he  considered  Davy's  sycophancy  and  subservience 
to  women  of  fashion  and  high  rank.  Coleridge  assured 
me  that  Davy  was  much  admired  by  various  women  of 
quality ;  and  so  enthusiastically  by  some,  that  they  would 
exclaim  audibly  at  the  public  lecture  room  — '  Oh,  those 
eyes !  those  brilliant  eyes ! '  and  that  the  philosopher  was 
weak  enough  to  be  pleased  with  this  homage. 

Worse  even  than  this,  in  Coleridge's  eyes,  was  Davy's 
behavior  at  fashionable  dinner-tables,  especially  at  Lord 
Darnley's,  where  the  elite  of  the  London  savans  and 
literati  at  that  time  congregated.  Davy  w^as  charged,  by 
many  others  as  well  as  Coleridge,  with  too  much  forget- 
ting the  dignity  of  science  in  such  society,  and  too  openly 
laying  himself  out  to  win  favor  or  applause.  '  I  could 
read  in  Lady  Darnley's  eyes,'  said  Coleridge  one  day, 
when  reporting  an  instance  of  Davy's  suppleness  in  ac- 
commodating himself  to  a  very  great  man's  theory  of 
aeroUths  —  'I  could  read  plainly  in  Lady  Darnley's  eyes 
the  very  words  —  "I  despise  this  man;  this  man  is 
degrading  himself  wilfully." '  However,  it  must  be  re- 
membered that  Sir  H.  Davy  had  a  much  larger  and  readier 
introduction  into  fashionable  society  than  Coleridge.  To 
profess  any  one  intelligible  art  or  accomplishment,  and 
in  this  one  to  have  obtained  an  acknowledged  or  reputed 
pre-eminence,  is  a  far  better  passport  into  privileged  so- 
ciety than  to  have  the  largest  intellectual  pretensions  of 
t  less  determinate  class.  The  very  narrowness  of  a 
man's  claims,  by  making  them  definite  and  appreciable,  is 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


an  advantage.  Not  merely  a  leader  in  a  brancli  of  art 
which  presupposes  a  high  sense  of  beauty,  a  cultivated 
taste,  and  other  gifts  properly  intellectual,  but  even  in 
some  art  presuming  little  beyond  manual  dexterity,  is  sure 
of  his  election  into  the  exclusive  circles.  Not  merely  a 
painter,  therefore,  but  a  fiddler,  provided  only  he  be  the 
first  of  his  order  —  nay,  I  doubt  not,  a  '  chin-chopper '  or 
Jews' -harp  player,  if  only  he  happen  to  exceed  all  other 
chin-choppers  or  Jew-harpists  —  will  find  himself  a  privi- 
leged man  in  comparison  with  the  philosopher,  or  the 
very  largest  and  amplest  intellect  that  ever  nature  en- 
dowed r  education  expanded.  The  advantage  lies  in 
doing  a  thing  which  has  a  name,  an  assignable  name ; 
and  the  narrower  is  the  art,  the  more  appreciable  are  the 
degrees  of  merit  in  that  art. 

Now,  it  is  the  distinction,  the  being  foremost,  the  place 
oi  protagonist^  or  Coryphoeus  in  an  art,  which  forms  the 
ground  of  eligibility  to  that  society  which  is  par  excellence 
distingue.  An  actor,  therefore,  beyond  almost  any  other 
artist,  except  only  the  portrait  painter,  whose  very  craft  is 
exercised  in  the  society  of  its  patrons,  and  cannot  (unless 
partially)  be  otherwise  exercised  —  an  actor,  I  say,  more 
easily  than  others,  is  admitted  to  graduate  in  such  society, 
because  his  rank  as  an  artist  is  more  precisely  ascertained 
by  public  reputation  daily  put  to  the  test.  Humiliating  to 
any  intellectual  man,  thinking  haughtily  of  those  preten- 
sions, and  standing  upon  no  other  title  himself,  is  the 
collision  which  sometimes  will  befall  him  in  aristocratic 
houses,  with  actors  even  of  a  low  order :  for  in  behalf  of 
such  actors,  supposing  them  to  have  comic  talents  for 
drollery,  is  sometimes  suspended  the  general  rule  which 
demands  first-rate  excellence ;  fourth  or  fifth-rate  excel- 
lence  on  the  stage  being  very  compatible  with  superiority 
m  convivial  talents.    Never  shall  I  forget  the  wrath  with 


SIR    HUMPHRY  DAYY. 


45 


which  a  Londou  wit,  who  had  indisputable  powers  of  con- 
versation, repeated  the  circumstances  of  a  professional 
call,  which  he  made,  by  appointment,  (for  he  was  a  law- 
yer,) upon  Young,  the  tragic  actor,  who,  in  the  absence  of 
higher  powers,  then  presided  on  the  metropolitan  stage :  — 
'  Sir,'  said  he,  in  the  room  where  I  was  left  to  cool  my 
heels  until  the  great  man  should  find  himself  disengaged 
for  a  person  so  inconsiderable  as  myself,  there  were 
strewed  upon  a  table,  for  scenic  effect,  cards  of  invitation 
to  dinner  parties  of  grandee  lords  by  the  dozen,  and 
to  the  balls,  routes,  soirees,  and  heaven  knows  what  all, 
of  countesses,  ambassadresses,  and  duchesses  by  the  score 
—  ay,  and  all  falling  within  a  few  days  ;  more  than  ever  I 
shall  have  in  my  whole  life.'  Yet  this  man,  who  thus 
complained,  was  rather  a  brilliant  '  diner-out,'  as  it  ia 
called. 

Coleridge,  as  is  notorious,  whenever  he  happened  to  be 
in  force,  or  even  in  artificial  spirits,  was  even  more  than 
brilliant ;  to  use  a  word  too  often  abused  and  prostituted, 
he  was  even  magnificent  beyond  all  human  standards ; 
and  a  felicitous  conversational  specimen  from  him,  was 
sometimes  the  most  memorable  chapter  in  a  man's  whole 
intellectual  experience  through  life.  Yet  this  Coleridge 
was  not  in  request,  was  not  sought  after  in  the  aristocratic 
circles  of  London  —  to  their  shame  be  it  said  !  He  had 
just  such  introductions  —  such  and  so  many  —  as  would, 
if  turned  to  account  by  a  pushing,  worldly  man,  have 
slipped  him  on  sufferance  into  many  more  houses  of  the 
same  distinction.  An  invitation  more  or  less,  costs  little  to 
H,  woman  of  fashion ;  and  he  niight  have  kept  his  ground, 
IS  many  admitted  lores  do,  upon  toleration,  in  some  two 
or  three  hundred  great  privileged  mansions.  Coleridge, 
however,  had  dignity  of  character  sufficient  to  court  no 
such  distinctions  ;  nor  would  his  spirits  have  been  equal  to 


46 


LITEJBAEY  REMINISCENCES. 


the  expense  of  labor  requisite  in  so  enormous  a  capital, 
for  a  duty  so  widely  dispersed.  Neither  do  I  overlook 
the  fact  that  Mr.  Coleridge's  peculiar  powers  were  not 
adapted  to  parties  beyond  the  scale  of  a  small  dinner 
party.  Yet  still  I  contend,  that,  for  the  honor  of  literature, 
and  for  the  sake  of  expressing  a  public  homage  to  the 
most  majestic  forms  in  which  the  intellect  of  the  age 
expresses  itself,  and  by  way  of  conciliating  the  grace  and 
sanction  of  Scholarship  and  authentic  Philosophy  to  the 
circles  of  rank  and  wealth,  upon  the  same  principle  which 
leads  those  same  circles  to  court  the  inferior  sanction  and 
grace  of  Art,  even  in  its  lowest  walks  —  for  all  these  rea- 
sons, Coleridge  should  have  been  courted  and  wooed  into 
such  society. 

I  am  not  apt  to  praise  the  Continent  at  the  expense 
of  my  own  country ;  but  here  is  an  instance  in  which 
(generally  speaking)  the  continental  taste  is  better  than 
ours.  No  great  meeting  is  complete  in  Germany,  in 
France,  in  Italy,  unless  the  intellect  of  the  land  —  its 
scholarship,  its  philosophy,  its  literature  —  be  there  by 
deputation :  '  the  table  is  not  full,'  anless  these  great 
.eading  interests  are  there  represented.  We  inaugurate 
our  wine  cups  by  remembering  the  King's  health ;  we 
Inaugurate  (let  it  not  be  thought  profane  to  make  such 
an  allusion)  our  great  civil  transactions  by  prayer  and 
remembrance  of  our  highest  relations:  in  reason,  then, 
and  by  all  analogy,  we  should  inaugurate  and  legitimate, 
as  it  were,  our  meetings  of  festal  pleasure,  by  the  pres- 
ence of  intellectual  power  and  intellectual  grace,  as  the 
ultimate  sources  upon  which  we  should  all  be  glad  to 
have  it  thought  that  our  pleasures  depend.  Aristocracy 
Df  Britain !  be  not  careless  of  the  philosophy  and  intellect 
of  the  age,  lest  it  be  thought  that  your  pursuits  and  taste 
^ht  in  alienation  from  both.    Dr.  Johnson  had  talked 


SIB  HTTMPHRY  DAYY. 


47 


himself  into  being  so  much  talked  of,  that  he  —  had  he 
lived  for  another  generation  —  would  have  become  indis- 
pensable to  fashionable  parties.  Coleridge,  who,  most 
assuredly,  was  far  superior  in  creative  power  and  fertility 
of  new  intuitions  to  Dr.  Johnson,  and  immeasurably 
Buperior  in  the  philosophic  understanding,  (for,  in  direct 
philosophic  speculation.  Dr.  J ohnson  never  even  attempted 
anything,  except  in  one  little  pamphlet  against  Soame 
Jenyns,)  was  scarcely  beginning  to  be  heard  of  amongst 
the  higher  circles  of  England  when  he  died.  The  reason 
for  comparing  him  with  Dr.  Johnson  is  on  account  of  their 
common  gifts  of  colloquial  power.* 

Did  I  not  once  hear  a  friend  objecting  to  me  such  cases 
as  those  of  Gibbon  ?  —  and,  again,  '  Wordsworth,'  said 
he  —  '  him  1  met  at  the  Marchioness  of  Salisbury's  party, 
at  Canning's,  at  the  English  Ambassador's  in  Paris,  and 
80  forth.'  True ;  but  Gibbon  was  a  Member  of  Parlia- 
ment, and  in  that  capacity,  not  as  a  literary  man,  he  had 
made  his  connections.  Wordsworth,  again,  was  intro- 
duced to  the  great  world  by  Sir  George  Beaumont,  a 
powerful  friend ;  for  he  had  a  large  fortune,  having  no 
children,  and  stood  midway  as  a  connecting  link  between 
the  world  of  art  and  the  world  of  fashion.  Most  cases 
are  liable  to  some  personal  or  casual  explanation  of  this 
sort,  where  they  seem  to  be  exceptions  to  the  general 
rule,  that  commanding  intellect  is  not  peculiarly  welcome 

*  Three  persons,  in  all,  may  be  mentioned,  from  the  ranks  of  intel- 
lectual people,  who  have  had  a  footing  in  privileged  society  —  I 
mean,  not  merely  had  an  admission  there,  but  a  known  and  exten- 
sive acceptation.  These  three  were  —  Lord  Byron,  Dr.  Johnson, 
jind  Sir  Walter  Scott.  Now,  it  is  observ  able  that  the  first  was,  in 
8ome  sense,  a  denizen  of  such  society  in  right  of  birth  and  rank  ; 
and,  of  both  the  others,  it  is  remarkable  that  their  passes  were  first 
countersigned  by  kings  — Dr.  Johnson's  by  George  III.,  Sir  Walter's 
by  George  IV. 


48 


lilTERAKY  KEMINISCENCES. 


in  the  most  aristocratic  circles ;  or,  at  least,  not  in  any- 
thing like  that  proportion  in  which  art,  nay,  the  lowest 
branches  of  the  lowest  arts,  are  welcome  ;  for  these  are 
absolutely  courted.  Actors,  for  seventy  or  eighty  years 
back  at  the  least,  have  formed  a  constituent  part  of  the 
British  aristocratic  circles. 

Yet  it  is  amusing  on  this  subject  to  recall  the  contra- 
dictory complaints  of  different  parties  according  to  their 
different  positions.  Coleridge  told  me  that  Sir  Humphry 
protested  that  a  man  had  no  chance  of  making  himself  a 
very  distinguished  person  in  the  eyes  of  London  society, 
unless  he  were  a  good  House  of  Commons  debater,  (and 
that  had  a  look  of  truth  about  it ;)  or,  secondly,  unless  he 
had  written  a  treatise  on  Greek  lyric  metres.  '  Ah,  if  I 
could  say  something  now  that  was  pretty  and  showy  on 
Choriambic  metre,  or  on  the  Versus  Dochmiaci  I '  This 
was  his  sneering  form  of  expression.  On  the  other  hand, 
at  that  very  time.  Dr.  Parr,  who  could  have  written  ably 
on  some  parts  of  philology,  and  Middleton,  a  friend  of 
Coleridge's,  and  soon  after  Bishop  of  Calcutta,  who  could 
have  written  Greek  lyric  metre  itself,  as  well  as  on  Greek 
metre  —  both  were  apt  to  complain  of  the  undue  usurpa- 
tion of  chemistry  and  the  kindred  researches,  over  the 
consecrated  studies  of  our  universities.  The  plain  truth 
was,  that  great  distinction  in  either  way  led  to  all  sorts 
of  public  honor  in  England.  Mathematics  is  the  sole 
unprotected  and  unprivileged  branch  cf  knowledge  — 
except  what  goes  under  the  name  of  metaphysics,  that 
being  absolutely  proscribed  —  not  so  much  without  privi- 
lege or  reward,  as  without  toleration. 

Davy  was  not  a  favorite  with  Coleridge ;  and  yet 
Coleridge,  who  grasped  the  whole  philosophy  of  Chemistry 
perhaps  better  than  any  man  except  Schelling,  admired 
him,  and  praised  him  much  ;  and  often  he  went  so  fai 


SIR  HUMPHRY  DAVY. 


49 


as  to  say  that  he  might  have  been  a  great  poet,  which 
perhaps  few  people  will  be  disposed  to  think,  from 
the  specimens  he  has  left  in  the  Bristol  Anthology, 
(edited  in  2  vols.,  about  the  year  1799-1800,  by  Mr. 
Southey.)  But,  however  much  he  might  admire  this  far- 
famed  man,  Coleridge  did  not  at  that  time  seem  greatly  to 
respect  him.  Once  or  twice  he  complained  a  little  that 
Davy  had  been  deficient  in  proper  attentions  to  himself. 
In  one  of  the  cases  alluded  to,  I  suggested,  which  I 
believe  really  to  have  been  the  case,  that  Davy  waited 
for  Mr.  Coleridge  to  make  the  first  advances.  But  this 
Coleridge  would  not  hear  of.  No,  no,  he  said  —  Davy 
was  the  superior  in  social  consideration  —  of  that  there 
could  be  no  doubt  —  and  to  the  superior  belonged  the 
initiatory  act  in  any  steps  for  proposing  the  relations  on 
which  they  were  to  stand.  I  do  not  mean,  however,  that 
Coleridge  had  much,  or  perhaps  any  soreness  on  this 
point ;  for  he  was  very  forgiving  in  such  cases.  But  he 
certainly  looked  with  a  disapproving  eye  on  what  he 
viewed  at  that  time  as  suppleness  and  want  of  self-respect 
in  Davy ;  and  he  also  charged  him  with  sensuality  in 
eating. 

I  know  not  whence  Coleridge  had  his  information  ;  but 
he  sometimes  commented  with  asperity  on  Davy's  luxuri- 
ousness  in  this  particular ;  and  he  repeated,  as  if  he 
knew  it  on  some  better  authority  than  that  of  rumor  — 
what  rumor,  however,  plentifully  buzzed  about  at  that 
time  —  that  Davy  would  sometimes  sit  down  in  solitary 
epicureanism  to  dishes  which  cost  him  half  a  guinea  each 
or  more.  Even  if  it  were  so,  many  epicureans  there  are, 
who  would  cry  out.  Is  that  all  ?  And  whatever  faults 
might  be  found  in  Davy  at  that  time,  I  have  reason  to 
believe  that  time  and  philosophy  did  much  to  raise  and 
strengthen  his  character  in  after  years  ;  for  as  to  foibles 
4 


50 


LITERAKT  REMINISCENCES. 


of  physical  temperament,  a  man  must  settle  that  account 
with  his  own  conscience.  For  others,  it  is  really  imperti- 
nent to  complain.  And  perhaps  the  great  temperance 
which  Mr.  Coleridge,  as  well  as  myself,  practised  through 
life,  may  have  heen  due  to  advantages  of  organic  struc- 
ture or  irritability  of  palate,  as  much  as  to  philosophic 
self-command.  At  least  for  myself,  I  can  say  that, 
though  very  few  men  indeed  have  maintained  so  simple 
and  almost  Hindooish  a  diet,  I  do  not  take  much  merit  to 
myself  for  my  forbearance ;  and  I  extend  the  largest 
indulgence  of  charitable  construction  to  all  men  —  except 
young  ones,  whose  gamut  of  pleasures  is  wider  —  for 
seeking  that  irritation  from  a  moderate  sensuality,  which 
the  flagging  pulses  of  life  no  longer  supply  through  other 
modes  of  excitement.  Davy  was  then  supposed  to  be 
making  a  fortune  by  some  manufactory  of  gunpowder, 
from  which  he  drew  a  large  share  of  profit,  not  for 
capital  contributed,  or  not  for  that  originally,  but  for 
chemical  secrets  communicated.  Soon  afterwards,  he 
married  a  widow  with  a  very  large  income,  (as  much  as 
£4000  a  year  by  common  report ;)  was  made  a  baronet ; 
was  crowned  with  the  laureateship  of  science,  viz.,  the 
President's  chair  in  the  London  Royal  Society  ;  withdrew 
in  consequence  from  further  lecturing  in  kid  gloves  of 
any  color  ;  drank  moderately,  as  a  man  of  elegant  tastes, 
of  the  cup  of  human  enjoyment ;  throve  into  a  prosperous 
leader  of  a  circle  ;  sickened  ;  travelled  for  health,  una- 
vailingly  for  himself,  not  altogether  for  others  ;  died  ;  and 
left  a  name  which,  from  the  necessity  of  things,  must 
ejrow  fainter  in  its  impression  under  each  revolving  sun, 
but  which,  at  one  time,  was  by  much  the  most  resounding 
name  —  the  most  splendid  in  the  estimate  of  the  laity,  if 
not  of  the  clerus  in  science  —  which  has  arisen  since  the 
days  of  Newton. 


MB.  GODTVIN. 


51 


Mr.  Godwin,  of  whom  the  reader  will  perhaps  wish  to 
hear  more  than  of  Sir  H.  Davy,  was  one  of  those  eminent 
persons  whom,  unfortunately,  I  saw  less  of  than  perhapa 
any  other  lion  of  the  times.  He  was  in  person  a  little 
man,  with  manners  peculiarly  tranquil,  philosophic,  and 
dignified  —  so  at  least  I  thought.  I  was  greatly  interested 
in  all  that  related  to  this  gentleman  ;  not  so  much,  not  at 
all  indeed  for  his  novels  —  which  I  do  not  profess  to 
admire  :  and  I  am  of  opinion  that,  if  Mr.  Godwin  himself 
had  been  asked  the  question  searchingly,  he  would  have 
acknowledged  that  I  had  seen  a  little  into  his  constitution 
of  mind,  when  I  pronounce  that  of  all  men  who  can  ever 
have  lived,  he,  by  preference,  must  have  found  the  labor 
most  irksome  of  creating  incidents,  and  making  the  nar- 
rative continue  to  move.  Cocytus  is  not  so  stagnant  or  so 
sluggish  in  motion  as  the  '  Caleb  Williams  '  in  parts,  and 
a  later  novel,  whose  name  I  forget,  (but  turning  upon  the 
case  of  kidnapping  an  heir  to  an  English  estate,  and 
carrying  him  to  the  Continent ;)  and  I  would  have  con- 
sented to  abide  by  an  appeal  to  Mr.  Godwin  himself, 
whether,  to  the  last  extremity  of  a  soil  parched  up  and 
arid,  he  had  not  felt  the  condition  of  his  own  mind  when 
summoned  to  produce  incidents.  Is  there  anything  dis- 
graceful in  this  dearth  of  incident  —  this  palsy  of  the 
fable-creating  faculty  ?  Far  from  it ;  so  far  from  it,  that 
the  powerful  minds  I  have  happened  to  know  were  cer- 
tainly those  who  had  least  of  it.  The  most  powerful 
mind  I  have  ever  known  had  none  of  it  —  positively  none. 
Shakspeare,  whom  few  men  would  disagree  in  making 

*  But  I  here  take  an  opportunity  of  observing,  that,  to  produce  a 
fable,  (i.  e.y  the  outline  or  frame-work  of  a  nexus  of  incidents,)  is 
\iot  very  difficult;  the  true  difficulty  is  in  making  the  fable  move  — 
m  calling  up  the  secondary  incidents,  through  which  and  by  whicli 
Jiis  fable  is  to  revolve 


LITEBARY  REMINISCENCES. 


FIRST  of  human  intellects,  though  double  difficulties  would 
arise  as  to  who  should  be  second,  and  threefold  difficul- 
ties as  to  who  should  be  third,  and  fourfold  as  to  who 
should  be  fourth  :  well,  Shakspeare  had,  perhaps,  as 
little  of  this  power  as  most  men,  who  have  had  (like  him) 
something  of  universal  minds.  Not,  therefore,  by  any 
possibility,  can  it  be  supposed  that  I  mean  to  disparage 
Mr.  Godwin  in  charging  him  with  this  defect.  And  yet, 
in  a  newspaper,  some  months  ago,  I  saw  the  novel  of 
*  Caleb  Williams  '  called  '  magnificent '  —  a  word  which, 
as  I  have  remarked  elsewhere,  is  more  than  any  other 
abused,  from  the  hotbed  excitement  of  the  age ;  and, 
previously,  by  some  years,  I  saw  a  paper  which,  in  other 
circumstances,  might  have  moved  laughter  —  a  paper 
which  compared  and  equalized  Mr.  Godwin,  as  a  novelist, 
with  Sir  Walter  Scott :  but  which,  because  I  fancied  that 
I  saw  in  it  the  filial  hand  of  a  gifted  writer,  whom  the 
whole  world,  from  the  east  to  the  west,  admires,  was 
fitted  by  its  very  extravagance,  to  draw  tears  on  account 
of  its  piety.  Involuntarily  I  thought  of  a  paper  which  a 
German  wife  had  written  about  her  ugly  husband  (Her- 
der), whom  all  others  had  admired,  but  whom  she  only 
thought  proper  to  find  handsome.  But  enough  of  what 
Mr.  Godwin  was  not,  I  felt  the  nearest  interest  in  this 
famous  man  on  three  separate  accounts  :  first,  as  the 
husband  of  Mrs.  Wolstonecraft.  —  What  a  woman  !  the 
sole  rival  in  this  country  of  the  noblest  of  her  sex,  Mad- 
ame Roland  —  the  rival,  I  mean,  in  constitution  of  mind  : 
would  that  she  had  glorified  her  life  and  end  by  the 
lAime  self-sacrifices,  which,  under  favoring  circumstances, 
she  was  equally  able  to  have  done  !  —  Next,  I  felt  a  pro* 
''ound  interest  in  Mr.  Godwin,  as  the  great  mormo  set 
up  to  terrify  all  England,  some  forty  years  ago,  by  two 
separate  classes  of  enemies  —  by  the  '  panic- of -propertv 


MR.  GODWIN. 


53 


men,'  as  Coleridge  cliristeiied  the  party  wlio  rose  in  Eng« 
land  under  the  terrors  of  the  French  *  war  against  the 
palace  —  peace  to  the  cottage ; '  and,  secondly,  by  the 
antagonists  of  what  was  then  called  French  philosophy^ 
or  Modern  philosophy  ;  or  the  philosophy  of  the  lllumi- 
nati. 

In  two  works  oi  great  circulation  at  that  time,  '  Pilgrim 
Good  Intent,'  and  Miss  Hamilton's  novel,  '  Modern  Phi- 
losophers,' the  two  great  moving  agents  are  Dr.  Priestley 
and  Mr.  Godwin.  His  connection  with  Mrs.  Wolstonecraft 
had  completed  what  the  first  or  4to  edition  of  his  '  Politi- 
cal Justice  '  had  begun  :  the  first  edition,  I  say  ;  for,  in 
the  second,  the  hypothesis  which  alarmed  the  '  men  of 
property,'  (as  Mr.  Hood  has  it,)  had  been  emasculated. 
Such  was  the  awe  inspired  at  that  time  by  these  shocks  to 
public  opinion,  that  most  people  felt  of  Mr.  Godwin  with 
the  same  alienation  and  horror  as  of  a  ghoul,  or  a  bloodless 
vampyre,  or  the  monster  created  by  Frankenstein.  It 
may  be  supposed  that  I  had  not  shared  in  these  thought- 
less impressions  ;  and  yet,  from  the  audacity  of  his  spec- 
ulations, I  looked  to  see  a  loud,  clamorous,  and,  perhaps, 
self-sufficient  dogmatist ;  whereas,  the  qualities  most  ap- 
parent on  the  surface  of  his  manners  were  a  gentle  dignity 
of  self-restraint  and  a  tranquil  benignity.  I  saw  him, 
however,  always  under  a  cloud  —  that  is,  under  the  dust 
and  confusion,  to  the  intellect,  of  a  large  party,  composed 
of  what  (by  analogy  to  its  slang  use)  might  be  termed  a 
mob  of  literary  swells.  Once  only  I  saw  him  in  a  smaller 
party,  at  the  Courier  Office  —  present,  Coleridge,  Words- 
worth, Southey,  Charles  Lamb,  Mr.  Stewart,  a  proprietor 
of  the  Courier,  and  some  fcur  or  five  others.  But,  on 
;his  occasion,  ij  happened,  which,  perhaps,  had  not  often 
happened  before,  that  neither  Coleridge  nor  Wordsworth 
U?ked  ;  Coleridge  being  more  than  usually  out  of  spirits ; 


54 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


VVords  worth  fatigued  by  attending  a  dull  debate  in  the 
House  of  Commons  ;  Southey  naturally  indisposed  to  the 
exertions  connected  with  colloquial  duties  ;  myself  and 
others  repressed  by  youth  and  reverence  for  our  company. 
Thus  it  fell  by  accident  to  Charles  Lamb  to  entertain  the 
company,  which  he  did  in  his  happiest  style,  as  a  Di- 
ogenes with  the  heart  of  a  St.  John  ;  but  nothing,  as  it 
happened  arose  to  call  out  the  powers  of  Mr.  Godwin. 
Though  balked,  therefore,  of  all  fair  occasion  for  measur- 
ing his  colloquial  calibre,  I  was  not  sorry  to  have  gone  off 
with  an  amended  impression  of  the  demeanor  and  general 
bearing  to  be  naturally  expected  from  revolutionary  minds, 
and  a  personal  redress  given  to  the  common  partisan 
portrait  circulated  of  one  who  had  filled  the  mouth  of 
declaimers  for  many  a  year,  and  become  a  byword  or  a 
commonplace  of  rhetoric  for  the  schools. 

In  1808,  going  up  to  London  from  Oxford,  about  May 
or  June,  in  order  to  attend  the  marriage  of  a  college 
friend,  I  met  a  lady  of  great  conversational  spirit  —  a 
Scottish  lady,  who,  with  her  daughter,  were  the  lions  for 
that  particular  season  in  the  higher  circles  of  London  ;  the 
mother  for  her  wit,  the  daughter  for  her  beauty.  This 
was  Mrs.  Grant,i  of  Laggan  —  a  valley  or  parish  in  the 
Scottish  Highlands.  The  interest  about  her  had  been 
evoked  for  this  particular  winter  of  London  by  the  quality 
of  her  introductions,  and  stimulated  by  the  beauty  of  the 
daughter.  But  the  permanent  ground  of  it  lay  in  her 
books  ;  which,  however,  were  thought  below  her  conver- 
.^ation.  Her  visit  was  chiefly  to  the  Bishop  of  London, 
whose  palace  she  had  just  left  at  the  time  I  met  her,  in 
:;»rder  to  fulfil  some  engagement  to  a  city  friend  —  the 
wife  of  a  rich  stockbroker  ;  and  there  it  was  I  had  the 
honor  of  being  presented  to  her.  Her  kindness  to  me 
was  particularly  flattering  ;  and,  to  this  day,  I  retain  the 


MRS.  GRANT. 


55 


impression  of  the  benignity  which  she  —  an  established 
wit,  and  just  then  receiving  incense  from  all  quarters  — 
showed  in  her  manners  to  me  —  a  person  utterly  unknown. 
Once,  however,  she  gave  a  rough  assault  to  my  deepest 
sensibilities .  Either  from  myself  or  from  somebody  else, 
she  had  learned  my  profound  veneration  for  the  poetry  of 
Wordsworth.  Upon  this,  she  suddenly  put  a  question  to 
me  upon  the  lines  of  Wordsworth,  on  seeing  a  robin  red- 
breast pursuing  a  butterfly.  The  particular  passage  which 
she  selected  was  to  this  effect :  — 

« If  Father  Adam  could  open  his  eyes. 
And  see  but  this  sight  beneath  the  skies. 
He  would  wish  to  close  them  again.* 

Now,'  said  Mrs.  Grant, '  what  possible  relation  can  Father 
Adam  have  to  this  case  of  the  bird  and  the  butterfly  ?  ' 
It  must  be  mentioned  here,  that  the  poem  was  not  in  the 
'  Lyrical  Ballads,'  by  which  originally  Wordsworth  had 
become  known,  but  in  a  second  collection  which  had  but 
just  issued  from  the  press.  The  volumes  had  been  in  the 
public  hands,  if  they  could  be  said  to  have  reached  the 
public  at  all  in  those  years,  for  about  a  fortnight ;  but 
in  mine,  who  had  only  recently  arrived  in  London,  not 
above  two  days.  Consequently,  I  had  not  seen  the  poem  ; 
and  being  quite  taken  aback  by  such  a  question,  in  a 
dinner  party  made  up  of  people  who  had  either  not  heard 
of  Wordsworth,  or  heard  of  him  only  as  an  extravagant 
and  feeble  innovator,  I  believe  that  I  made  some  absurd 
answer  about  Adam  being  possibly  taken  as  a  represen- 
tative man,  or  representing  the  general  sensibilities  of 
human  nature.  Anything  passes  in  company  for  a  reason 
or  an  explanation,  when  people  have  not  the  demoniac 
passion  for  disputation ;  and  Mrs.  Grant  accordingly 
Dowed,  in  sign  of  acquiescence.    I  easily  judged,  bow- 


56 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


ever,  that  slie  could  not  have  been  satisfied  ;  and  in  going 
home,  with  a  strong  feeling  of  self-reproach  for  having 
but  ill  sustained  a  poetic  reputation  for  which  !  was  so 
intensely  jealous,  I  set  myself  to  consider  what  could 
be  the  meaning  for  tbis  connection  of  Father  Adam  with 
the  case  ;  and,  without  having  read  the  poem,  by  the 
light  of  so  much  as  Mrs.  Grant  had  quoted,  instantly  it 
flashed  upon  me  that  the  secret  reference  must  be  to  that 
passage  in  the  '  Paradise  Lost,'  where  Adam  is  repre- 
sented —  on  the  very  next  morning  after  his  fatal  trans- 
gression, and  whilst  yet  in  suspense  as  to  the  shape  in 
which  the  dread  consequences  would  begin  to  reveal 
themselves,  and  how  "soon  begin  —  as  lifting  up  his  eyes, 
and  seeing  the  first  sad  proof  that  all  flesh  was  tainted, 
and  that  corruption  had  already  travelled,  by  mysterious 
sympathy,  through  universal  nature.  The  passage  is  most 
memorable,  and  can  never  be  forgotten  by  one  who  has 
thoughtfully  read  it :  — 

*  The  bird  of  Jove  stoop 'd  from  his  airy  flight. 
Two  birds  of  gayest  plume  before  him  drove; 
Down  from  the  hills,  the  beast  that  reigns  in  woods  — 
First  hunter  then  —  pursued  a  gentle  brace, 
Goodliest  of  all  the  forest  —  hart  and  hind. 
Adam  observed '  

Here,  then,  we  find,  that  in  Milton's  representation  of  the 
Fall,  the  very  earliest  —  not  the  second  or  third,  but 
positively  the  very  first  —  outward  signs  by  which  Adam 
was  made  aware  of  a  secret  but  awful  revolution,  which 
had  gone  like  a  whisper  through  all  nature,  was  this  very 
phenomenon  of  two  animals  pursuing  in  wrath  others  of 
more  innocent  and  beautiful  appearance.  Reasonably 
therefore,  we  may  imagine,  for  the  purposes  of  a  poet, 
that  if  Adam  were  permitted  to  open  his  eyes  again  upon 
this  earthly  scene  of  things,  it  would  send  a  peculi?* 


MRS.  GKANT. 


67 


anguish  through  his  thoughts  to  see  renewed  before  him 
that  very  same  image  and  manifestation  of  ruin  by  which 
his  eyes  had  been  met  and  his  suspense  had  been  resolved 
on  the  very  first  morning  succeeding  to  his  fall.  The 
only  question  which  could  arise  after  this  upon  the  pro- 
priety of  Mr.  Wordsworth's  allusion,  was,  Had  he  a  right 
to  presume  in  his  readers  such  a  knowledge  of  Milton  ? 
The  answer  to  which  is  —  that  Milton  is  as  much  a  pre- 
sumable or  presupposable  book  in  the  reference  of  a 
poet,  as  nature  herself  and  the  common  phenomena  of 
nature.  These  a  poet  postulates,  or  presupposes  in  his 
reader,  and  is  entitled  to  do  so.  However,  I  mentioned 
the  case  afterwards  to  Mr.  Wordsworth ;  and,  in  conse- 
quence of  what  I  then  said,  he  added  the  note  of  reference 
to  Milton,  which  will  be  found  in  the  subsequent  editions. 
Another,  and  hardly,  perhaps,  so  excusable  a  mistake, 
had  been  made  upon  the  very  same  poem  by  The  Edin- 
hurgh  Review,  Mr.  Wordsworth  had  noticed  the  house- 
hold character  of  the  red-breast  and  his  consecration  to 
the  feelings  of  men  in  all  Christian  countries ;  and  this  he 
had  expressed  by  calling  it 

*  The  bird,  whom  by  some  name  or  other. 
All  men  who  know  thee  call  their  brother' — 

which  passage  the  Reviewer  had  so  little  understood  as  to 
direct  attention  to  it  by  italics.  Yet  the  explanation  was 
found  in  what  immediately  followed  :  — 

*  Their  Thomas  in  Finland 
And  Russia  far  inland ; 
The  Peter  of  Norway  boors.* 

The  bird  is  Robin  with  us  in  Britain,  Thomas  in  anotbei 
land,  Peter  in  another,  and  so  on  This  was  the  explana- 
tion of  what  the  Reviewer  thought  so  absurd  or  inex- 
plicable.   To  call  a  bird  by  a  christian  name  is,  in  efieot, 


t}8 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


when  expressed  by  a  poet,  to  '  call  him  a  brother '  of  man. 
And  with  equal  ease  might  all  the  passages  be  explained 
which  have  hitherto  been  stumbling-blocks  to  critics,  where 
at  least  the  objection  has  arisen  out  of  misconstruction  of 
the  sense. 

Some  years  after  this,  I  saw  Mrs.  Grant  again  in  Edin- 
burgh ;  but  grief  was  then  heavy  upon  her :  the  fair- 
haired  young  lady,  the  '  Scottish  Beauty '  of  the  London 
circles  in  1808,  had  gone  to  an  early  grave  ;  and  others 
of  her  family  were  expected  to  follow.  Her  '  Letters 
from  the  Mountains  '  made  a  considerable  impression  at 
the  time  of  its  first  appearance.  But  the  work  which 
interested  me  the  most  was  that  in  which  she  painted  her 
own  early  years  as  passed  among  the  Anglo-Dutch  of  the 
New  England  States.  It  was  a  condition  of  society  which 
had  thus  much  of  a  paradisiacal  condition  —  that  none 
was  '  afore  or  after  the  other  ;  '  no  jealous  precedencies  ; 
no  suspicions  ;  no  spectacles  of  grinding  poverty.  Aris- 
tocracy, there  was  none ;  pauperism,  there  was  none  ; 
and  every  member  of  the  community  saw  a  friend  and  a 
well-wisher  in  every  other.  Happy,  happy  state,  in  which 
were  to  be  found 

*  No  fears  to  beat  away,  no  strife  to  heal; ' 

a  state  which,  with  the  expansion  of  civilization  as  it 
travels  through  American  forests,  may,  for  a  century  to 
come,  be  continually  renewed  in  those  lands,  but  else- 
where I  fear  never  more  in  this  world. 

I  have  been  anticipating  a  little,  and  looking  forward 
into  years  which  I  have  not  yet  regularly  reached.  It 
may  surprise  a  reader  who  has  gone  through  the  slight 
records  of  my  life,  to  find  me  originally  as  a  bc»y,  moving 
amongst  the  circles  of  the  nobility,  and  now  courting  only 
those  of  intellectual  people.    The  final  resolution  which 


WALES. 


59 


led  me  into  renouncing  my  connections  with  ranks  above 
my  own,  arose  upon  the  following  occasion.  On  leaving 
school  clandestinely,  which  I  did  some  weeks  before  my 
seventeenth  birthday,  I  went  into  Wales  ;  where  I  con- 
tinued for  months  to  walk  about.  As  long  as  I  kept  up 
any  negotiation  with  my  guardians,  I  received  a  regular 
allowance  of  a  guinea  a  week.  But  upon  this  sum,  not, 
however,  (as  may  be  supposed,)  without  great  difficulty,  I 
continued  to  obtain  a  bed,  and  some  apology  for  supper, 
in  the  shape  of  coffee  or  tea,  at  the  inns  scattered  about 
the  Welsh  valleys  for  the  sake  of  the  tourist.  The  old 
village  inns  had,  till  lately,  charged  the  most  primitive 
prices  —  sixpence,  for  example,  had  been  the  usual  rate 
for  a  dinner,  and  so  on  ;  but  all  this  had  very  nearly 
disappeared  under  the  great  revolution  of  the  times.  W ar 
prices  had  arisen  in  the  great  markets  ;  a  great  influx  of 
tourists  and  artists  had  begun  to  set  in  to  the  Welsh 
valleys ;  elegant  hotels  arose  on  every  side ;  and  the 
prices  were  pretty  much  as  on  the  Bath  road.  Finding, 
therefore,  that  my  three  shillings  a  day  did  but  little  at 
these  showy  inns,  more  than  the  better  half  being  at  once 
exhausted  upon  a  bed  and  the  perquisites  to  '  waiter,' 
'  chambermaid,'  and  '  boots,'  I  came  to  the  resolution  of 
carrying  a  tent  with  me  and  sleeping  out  of  doors.  This 
tent,  as  may  be  imagined,  was  miserably  small ;  both  to 
make  it  more  portable,  and  also  on  account  of  the  tent- 
pole,  which,  to  avoid  notice  and  trouble,  was  no  more 
than  a  common  walking-cane.  I  pitched  my  tent  always 
on  the  lee-side  of  a  hill ;  and,  in  a  land  so  solitary,  and 
free  from  '  high- viced '  towns,  1  apprehended  but  little 
from  any  enemies,  except  the  wild  mountain  cattle :  these 
eometimes  used  to  take  umbrage  at  my  intrusion,  and 
advance  upon  my  encampment  in  the  darkness,  with  what 
'intentions  I  could  not  discover,  nor  perhaps  did  they 


tJO  LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 

know  ;  but  I  lay  in  constant  anxiety  that  some  lumbenng 
cow  or  other  should  break  into  my  preserve,  and  poach 
her  heavy  foot  into  my  face.  This,  however,  was  not 
the  worst  evil,  I  soon  found  the  truth  of  Napoleon's 
criticism  at  St.  Helena,  on  a  proposal  made  for  improving 
the  art  of  war  by  portable  tents,  treble-barrelled  guns, 
&c.  —  that  the  practice  of  bivouacking,  which  offended  so 
deeply  the  humanity  of  some  philanthropic  people,  was 
in  fact  most  favorable  to  the  health  of  troops  ;  and  that  at 
most,  a  screen  hung  up  to  windward  was  the  utmost  pro- 
tection from  open  air,  (or  properly  from  the  weather, 
rather  than  the  air,)  which  is  consistent  with  health.  The 
loftier  tents  of  the  officers  may  be  an  exception  ;  but 
mine,  which  resembled  more  the  humbler  and  crowded 
tents  of  the  privates,  confirmed  strikingly  the  medical 
objection  of  Napoleon.  I  soon  found  it  necessary  to  re- 
sign it  in  that  form  ;  using  it  rather  as  a  screen  against 
wind,  or,  on  a  calm  night,  as  a  pillow.  Selecting  the 
ground  w^ell  on  such  occasions,  I  found  the  advantage  of 
this  sub  dio  sleeping,  in  improved  health  ;  but  summer 
air  and  dry  ground  disappearing,  I  was  at  length  obliged 
to  seek  other  modes  of  lodging. 

One  morning,  however,  during  the  season  when  I  prac- 
tised it,  I  was  sitting  as  yet  undecided  upon  my  day's 
movements,  when  a  sound  of  wheels,  as  if  rapidly  ap- 
proaching my  own  station,  became  audible.  I  rose  and 
went  forwards  in  the  direction  of  the  sound,  with  as  much 
surprise  as  if  '  Gabriel's  hounds  '  had  been  really  ap- 
proaching ;  for  my  idea  was,  that  I  had  taken  up  my 
Bleeping  quarters  on  a  wild  moor  remote  from  roads. 
A  little  ascent,  and  the  turning  of  a  knoll,  showed  me 
that  in  part  I  was  right:  a  wild  moor  it  was,  but  one 
K^hich  was  traversed  by  the  high  road  between  Kerniogge 
and  Llanrwst.    A  travelling  carriage  was  advancing,  and 


WALES. 


61 


Bwept  past  me  at  tlie  very  moment  when  I  toiiclied  the 
high  road.  The  carriage  seemed  known  to  me ;  and  on 
the  panels  I  observed  the  coronet  of  a  marquis  ;  and, 
immediately  after,  I  saw  a  head  put  out  of  the  window, 
ind  looking  at  me  until  the  downhill  track  and  abrupt 
rfurns  of  the  road  hid  me  from  sight.  It  was  a  natural 
conclusion  enough,  this  being  the  high  road  to  Holyhead, 
that  the  carriage  I  had  just  seen  might  be  that  of  my 
Irish  friend,  who  had  been  created  a  marquis  soon  after 
[  left  Ireland ;  and  the  face  of  the  person  who  surveyed 
me  so  keenly,  doubtless  one  of  his  household,  knowing 
me  better  than  I  knew  her.  Great  was  m>  joy  at  this 
probability  ;  and  without  delay,  I  struck  my  tent  and 
walked  to  Llanrwst.  The  distance  proved  to  be  six  miles ; 
and  on  my  arrival  the  bird  was  flown.  I  went  into  the 
stable-yard,  and  inquired  earnestly  of  a  group  just  fresh 
from  attending  to  the  horses  recently  come  in  — '  Who 
was  the  last  traveller  ? '  All  remembered  that  it  was  a 
lord,  and  that  it  was  a  marquis.    '  Was  it  the  Marquis  of 

S  ?  '    '  Yes  :  that  was  the  very  title,'  several  voices 

answered  ;  '  and  he  would  stop  for  dinner  at  Conway.' 
Thither  I  resolved  to  pursue  ;  and,  for  that  purpose,  went 
into  the  house.  Luckily,  the  landlord  was  able  to  inform 
me  that  the  noble  marquis  was  not  my  friend,  but  Lord 
Bath.  And,  by  this  timely  information,  I  was  saved  from 
the  very  awkward  embarrassment  of  finding  myself  at 
Conway  with  a  chaise  and  four  to  pay,  and  no  money  at 
my  command.  The  momentary  evil  was  past.  But  the 
sort  of  danger  I  had  escaped,  of  finding  myself  viewed  by 
the  inn  at  Conway  as  a  fraudulent  tourist,  threw  me  pow- 
erfully on  considering  what  had  been  my  motive  for 
pursuing  the  party,  supposing  even  that  it  had  been 

Lord  S  .    What  would  have  come  of  it  ?    He  would 

laturally  have  been  pleased  to  see  me,  as  everybody  is 


62 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


pleased  to  eee  old  friends  after  a  long  interval ;  lie  would 
have  asked  me  to  dine  with  him ;  and,  supposing  a  vacant 
seat  in  his  carriage,  he  would  have  asked  me  to  go  along 
with  him  to  Holyhead  or  Dublin.  But  even  so,  he  would 
not  have  particularly  admired  my  call  on  his  purse  for  a 
chaise  and  four.  Next  I  went  on  to  ask  myself  —  What 
if  all  this  were  conceded,  and  it  should  happen  that  he 
really  was  pleased,  and  wishing  for  my  company  to  Dub- 
lin —  upon  what  principles  or  views  did  I  mean  to  culti- 
vate a  connection  of  this  sort  ?  Boyish  years  stood  upon 
other  grounds  ;  but,  on  coming  to  an  accountable  age,  1 
knew  that  everywhere  sprung  up  an  impertinent  question 
as  to  a  young  man's  future  destination.  Up  to  sixteen  or 
fifteen,  a  boy  is  ranked  upon  the  footing  of  his  father's 
rank.  After  that  time,  his  rank  is  deduced  proleptically 
from  the  probable  stations  which  he  will  hold  in  future 
times. 

Now,  if  my  object  was  to  make  myself  a  trading  Mem- 
ber of  Parliament,  certainly  the  connections  which  I  had 
with  ministerial  noblemen  would  be  of  use.  Through 
them,  a  borough  might  be  had  ;  and,  that  obtained,  all  was 
done  for  a  man  which  he  could  owe  to  fortune  —  the  rest 
depended  upon  himself.  But,  supposing  that  personally 
tbere  should  be  no  objections,  still  I  had  seen  enough  of 
borough- disposers  to  know  that  they  were  not  willing  to 
give,  without  a  consideration,  something  more  than  that  of 

support  to  a  particular  line  of  politics.    Lord  S  in 

particular,  who  in  those  days  had  some  borough  interest, 
looked  upon  it  as  '  bespoke '  for  family  connections.  And 
BO  of  others.  But  the  most  signal  bar  to  all  this  was,  my 
3wn  grievous  disinclination  to  any  mode  of  public,  or 
ioisy,  or  contentious  life.  Peace,  liberty  to  think,  solitude 
~  these  were  the  cravings  of  my  heart.  And  unless  I 
went  among  the  nobility  in  the  character  of  a  demanding^ 


WALES. 


insolent  claimant,  I  knew  that  I  liad  better  not  go  at  all. 
Inevitably  the  question  arises  —  Upon  what  footing  is  this 
man  here  ?  Is  it  his  natural  station  ?  No  :  then  at  least 
he  is  an  interloper ;  and  the  chances  are,  that  he  is  a  toad- 
eater  and  sycophant.  Suppose  he  is  not  —  yet  the  known 
presumption  that  he  is  (a  presumption  of  which  he  cannot 
be  unaware)  loads  him  with  almost  the  worst  reproaches 
of  the  reality.  He  is  no  sycophant ;  yet  he  is  willing  to 
stand  the  presumption  that  he  is,  and  the  consequent  con- 
tempt  For  what  ?    Every  way,  I  saw  that  my  own 

dignity,  which  above  all  things  a  man  should  scrupulously 
maintain,  required  that  I  should  no  longer  go  into  any 
circles  where  I  did  not  stand  on  my  own  native  footing  — 
propria  jure.  Many  a  time  had  I  wondered  at  the  false 
conceptions  of  dignity  which  could  lead  Addison  to  think 
himself  elevated  by  marriage  with  Lady  Warwick  —  a 
husband  to  seek  protection,  as  it  were,  from  a  wife  !  What 
had  been  abundantly  right  for  me  as  a  boy,  ceased  to  be 
-ight  for  me  when  I  ceased  to  be  a  boy. 


64 


lilTEBA^UY  BSMIiriSCENCES. 


CHAPTER  III, 

RECOLLECTIONS  OF  CHARLES  LAMB. 

Amongst  the  earliest  literary  acquaintances  I  made 
was  that  with  the  inimitable  Charles  Lamb :  inimitable, 
I  say,  but  the  word  is  too  limited  in  its  meaning  ;  for,  as 
is  said  of  Milton  in  that  well-known  life  of  him  attached 
to  all  common  editions  of  the  '  Paradise  Lost/  (Fenton's, 
I  think,)  '  in  both  senses  he  was  above  imitation.'  Yes ; 
it  was  as  impossible  to  the  moral  nature  of  Charles  Lamb 
that  he  should  imitate  another,  as,  in  an  intellectual  sense, 
it  was  impossible  that  any  other  should  successfully  imi- 
tate him.  To  write  with  patience  even,  not  to  say  genially, 
for  Charles  Lamb  it  was  a  very  necessity  of  his  constitu- 
tion that  he  should  write  from  his  own  wayward  nature ; 
and  that  nature  was  so  peculiar  that  no  other  man,  the 
ablest  at  mimicry,  could  counterfeit  its  voice.  But  let 
me  not  anticipate  ;  for  these  were  opinions  about  Lamb 
which  I  had  not  when  I  first  knew  him,  nor  could  have 
had  by  any  reasonable  title.  *  Elia,'  be  it  observed,  the 
exquisite  '  Elia,'  was  then  unborn ;  Lamb  had  as  yet 
published  nothing  to  the  world  which  proclaimed  him  in 
his  proper  character  of  a  most  original  man  of  genius  :  * 

*  *  Man  of  genius  *  —  *  man  of  talenV  I  have,  in  another  place, 
laid  down  what  I  conceive  to  be  the  true  ground  of  distinction  be- 
tween genius  and  talent ;  which  lies  mainly  in  this  —  that  genius  is 
Intellectual  power  impregnated  with  the  moral  nature,  and  expresses 


RECOLLECTIONS  OF  CHARLES  LAMB.  65 

Rt  best,  he  couli  have  been  thought  no  more  than  a  man 
of  talent  —  and  talent  moving  in  a  narrow  path,  with  a 
power  rather  of  mimicking  the  quaint  and  the  fantastic, 
than  any  large  grasp  over  catholic  beauty.  And,  there- 
fore, it  need  not  offend  the  most  doting  admirer  of  Lamb 
IIS  he  is  now  known  to  us,  a  brilliant  star  for  ever  fixed  in 
the  firmament  of  English  literature,  that  I  acknowledge 
myself  to  have  sought  his  acquaintance  rather  under  the 
reflex  honor  he  had  enjoyed  of  being  known  as  Coler- 
idge's friend,  than  for  any  which  he  yet  held  directly 
and  separately  in  his  own  person.  My  earliest  advances 
towards  this  acquaintance  had  an  inauspicious  aspect ;  and 
it  may  be  worth  while  reporting  the  circumstances,  for 
they  were  characteristic  of  Charles  Lamb ;  and  the  im- 
mediate result  was  —  that  we  parted,  not  perhaps  (aa 
Lamb  says  of  his  philosophic  friend  R.  and  the  Parisians) 
*  with  mutual  contempt,'  but  at  least  with  coolness  ;  and 
on  my  part,  with  something  that  might  have  even  turned 
to  disgust — founded,  however,  entirely  on  my  utter  mis- 
apprehension of  Lamb's  character  and  his  manners  — 
had  it  not  been  for  the  winning  goodness  of  Miss  Lamb, 
before  which  all  resentment  must  have  melted  in  a  mo- 
ment. 

a  synthesis  of  the  active  in  man  with  his  original  organic  capacity 
of  pleasure  and  pain.  Hence  the  very  word  genius j  because  the 
genial  nature  in  its  whole  organization  is  expressed  and  involved  in 
it.  Hence,  also,  arises  the  reason  that  genius  is  always  peculiar  and 
individual ;  one  man's  genius  never  exactly  repeats  another  man's. 
But  talent  is  the  same  in  all  men;  and  that  which  is  effected  by 
talent,  can  never  serve  to  identify  or  indicate  its  author.  Hence, 
too,  that,  although  talent  is  the  object  of  respect,  it  never  conciliates 
►ove;  yoM  love  a  man  of  talent  perhaps  in  concretOy  but  not  talent-, 
whereas  genius,  even  for  itself,  is  idolized.  I  am  the  more  proud  of 
this  distinction,  since  I  have  seen  the  utter  failure  of  Mr.  Coleridge, 
judging  from  his  attempt  in  his  «  Table  Talk.' 
5 


66 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


It  was  either  late  in  1804  or  early  in  1805,  according 
to  my  present  computations,  that  I  had  obtained  from  a 
literary  friend  a  letter  of  introduction  to  Mr.  Lamb.  All 
that  I  knew  of  his  works  was  his  play  of '  John  Woodvil,' 
which  I  had  bought  in  Oxford,  and  perhaps  I  only  had 
bought  throughout  that  great  University,  at  the  time  of 
my  matriculation  there,  about  the  Christmas  of  1803. 
Another  book  fell  into  my  hands  on  that  same  morning, 
I  recollect  —  the  '  Gebir '  of  Mr.  Walter  Savage  Landor  — 
which  astonished  me  by  the  splendor  of  its  descriptions 
(for  I  had  opened  accidentally  upon  the  sea-nymph's  mar- 
riage with  Tamor,  the  youthful  brother  of  Gebir)  —  and  I 
bought  this  also.  Afterwards,  when  placing  these  two 
most  unpopular  of  books  on  the  same  shelf  with  the 
other  far  holier  idols  of  my  heart,  the  joint  poems  of 
Wordsworth  and  Coleridge  as  then  associated  in  the  '  Ly- 
rical Ballads'  —  poems  not  equally  unknown,  perhaps  a 
little  better  known,  but  only  with  the  result  of  being  more 
openly  scorned,  rejected  —  I  could  not  but  smile  internally 
at  the  fair  prospect  I  had  of  congregating  a  library  which 
no  man  had  read  but  myself.  '  John  Woodvil '  I  had 
almost  studied,  and  Miss  Lamb's  pretty  'High-Born 
Helen,'  and  the  ingenious  imitations  of  Burton  ;  these 
I  had  read,  and,  to  a  certain  degree,  must  have  admired, 
for  some  parts  of  them  had  settled  without  effort  in  my 
memory.  I  had  read  also  the  Edinburgh  notice  of  them ; 
and  with  v/hat  contempt  may  be  supposed  from  the  fact, 
that  my  veneration  for  Wordsworth  transcended  all  that 
I  felt  for  any  created  being,  past  or  present ;  insomuch 
that,  in  the  summer,  or  spring  rather,  of  that  same  year, 
and  full  eight  months  before  I  first  went  to  Oxford,  I  had 
ventured  to  address  a  letter  to  him,  through  his  publishers 
the  Messrs.  Longman,  (which  letter.  Miss  Wordsworth  in 
after  years  assured  me  they  believed  to  be  the  production 


RECOIiLECTIONS  OF  CHARLES  LAMB  67 

of  some  person  much  older  than  I  represented  myself,) 
and  that  in  due  time  I  had  been  honored  by  a  long  answer 
from  Wordsworth;  an  honor  which,  I  well  remember, 
kept  me  awake,  from  mere  excess  of  pleasure,  through 
a  long  night  in  June,  1803.  It  was  not  to  be  supposed 
that  the  very  feeblest  of  admirations  could  be  shaken  by 
mere  scorn  and  contumely,  unsupported  by  any  shadow 
of  a  reason.  Wordsworth,  therefore,  could  not  have  suf- 
fered in  any  man's  opinion,  from  the  puny  efforts  of  this 
nev/  autocrat  amongst  reviews ;  but  what  was  said  of 
Lamb,  though  not  containing  one  iota  of  criticism,  either 
good  or  bad,  had  certainly  more"  point  and  cleverness. 
The  supposition  that  '  J ohn  Woodvil '  might  be  a  lost 
drama,  recovered  from  the  age  of  Thespis,  and  entitled 
to  the  hircus,  &c.,  must,  T  should  think,  have  won  a  smile 
from  Lamb  himself ;  or  why  say  '  Lamb  himself,'  which 
means  '  even  Lamb,'  when  he  would  have  been  the  very 
first  to  laugh,  (as  he  was  afterwards  among  the  first  to 
hoot  at  his  own  farce,)  provided  only  he  could  detach  his 
mind  from  the  ill-nature  and  hard  contempt  which  accom- 
panied the  wit.  This  wit  had  certainly  not  dazzled  my 
eyes  in  the  slightest  degree.  So  far  as  I  was  left  at 
leisure,  by  a  more  potent  order  of  poetry,  to  think  of  the 
'  John  Woodvil '  at  all,  I  had  felt  and  acknowledged  a 
delicacy  and  tenderness  in  the  situations  as  well  as  the 
sentiments,  but  disfigured,  as  I  thought,  by  quaint,  gro- 
tesque, and  mimetic  phraseology.  The  main  defect,  how- 
ever, of  which  I  complained,  was  defect  of  power.  I 
thought  Lamb  had  no  right  to  take  his  station  amongst 
the  inspired  writers  who  had  just  then  risen,  to  throw 
new  blood  into  our  literature,  and  to  breathe  a  breath  of 
.ife  through  the  worn-out,  or,  at  least,  torpid  organization 
of  the  national  mind.  He  belonged,  I  thought,  to  the  old 
.Uterature  ;  and,  as  a  poet,  he  certainly  does.    There  were 


68 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCE?. 


in  his  verses  minute  scintillations  of  genius  —  now  anil 
then,  even  a  subtle  sense  of  beauty ;  and  there  were  shy 
graces,  lurking  half-unseen,  like  violets  in  the  shade.  But 
there  was  no  power  on  a  colossal  scale ;  no  breadth  ;  no 
choice  of  great  subjects;  no  wrestling  with  difficulty;  no 
creative  energy.  So  I  thought  then;  and  so  I  should 
think  now,  if  Lamb  were  viewed  chiefly  as  a  poet.  Since 
those  days,  he  has  established  his  right  to  a  seat  in  any 
company.  But  why  ?  and  in  what  character?  As  '  Elia : ' 
—  the  essays  of  '  Elia '  are  as  exquisite  a  gem  amongst 
the  jewellery  of  literature,  as  any  nation  can  show.  They 
do  not,  indeed,  suggest  to  the  typifying  imagination,  a 
Last  Supper  of  Da  Vinci,  or  a  Group  from  the  Sis  tine 
Chapel ;  but  they  suggest  some  exquisite  cabinet  paint- 
ing ;  such,  for  instance,  as  that  Carlo  Dolce  known  to  all 
who  have  visited  Lord  Exeter's  place  of  Burleigh ;  (by 
the  way,  I  bar  the  allusion  to  Charles  Lamb,  which  a 
shameless  punster  suggests  in  the  name  Carlo  Dolce;) 
and  in  this  also  resembling  that  famous  picture  —  that 
many  critics  (Hazlitt  amongst  others)  can  see  little  or 
nothing  in  it.  Quam  nihil  ad  genium,  Papiniane,  tuum  ! 
Those,  therefore,  err  in  my  opinion,  who  present  Lamb  to 
our  notice  amongst  the  poets.  Very  pretty,  very  elegant, 
very  tender,  very  beautiful  verses  he  has  written ;  nay, 
twice  he  has  written  verses  of  extraordinary  farce,  almost 
demoniac  force  —  viz.,  *  The  Three  Graves,'  and  'The 
Gipsy's  Malison.'  But,  speaking  generally,  he  writes 
verses  as  one  to  whom  that  function  was  a  secondary  and 
pccasional  function ;  not  his  original  and  natural  vocation ; 
not  an  f^yov,  but  a  nuQ^Qyov, 

For  the  reasons,  therefore,  I  have  given,  never  thinking 
of  Charles  Lamb  as  a  poet,  and,  at  that  time,  having  no 
means  for  judging  of  him  in  any  other  character,  I  had 
requested  the  letter  of  introduction  to  him,  rather  with  a 


BECOLLECTIOXS  OF   CHARLES  LAMB. 


69 


riew  to  c§ome  further  knowledge  of  Coleridge,  (who  waa 
then  absent  from  England,)  than  from  any  special  interest 
about  Lamb  himself.  However,  I  felt  the  extreme  dis- 
courtesy of  approaching  a  man,  and  asking  for  his  time 
j:jid  civility  under  such  an  avowal :  and  the  letter,  there- 
fore, as  I  believe,  or  as  I  requested,  represented  me  in 
the  light  of  an  admirer.  I  hope  it  did  ;  for  that  character 
might  have  some  excuse  for  what  followed,  and  heal  the 
unpleasant  impression  likely  to  be  left  by  a  sort  of  fracas 
which  occurred  at  my  first  meeting  with  Lamb.  This 
was  so  characteristic  of  Lamb,  that  I  have  often  laughed 
at  it  since  I  came  to  know  what  was  characteristic  of 
Lamb.  But  first  let  me  describe  my  brief  introductory 
call  upon  him  at  the  India  House.  I  had  been  told  that 
he  was  never  to  be  found  at  home  except  in  the  evenings ; 
and  to  have  called  then  would  have  been,  in  a  manner, 
forcing  myself  upon  his  hospitalities,  and  at  a  moment 
when  he  might  have  confidential  friends  about  him ; 
besides  that,  he  was  sometimes  tempted  away  to  the 
theatres.  I  went,  therefore,  to  the  India  House  ;  made 
inquiries  amongst  the  servants  ;  and,  after  some  trouble, 
(for  that  was  early  in  his  Leadenhall  Street  career,  and 
lossibly,  he  was  not  much  known,)  I  was  shown  into  a 
small  room,  or  else  a  small  section  of  a  large  one,  (thirty- 
four  years  affects  one's  remembrance  of  some  circum- 
stances,) in  which  was  a  very  lofty  writing-desk,  separated 
by  a  still  higher  railing  from  that  part  of  the  floor  on 
which  the  profane  —  the  laity,  like  myself  —  were  allowed 
to  approach  the  derus,  or  clerkly  rulers  of  the  room. 
Within  the  railing,  sat,  to  the  best  of  my  remembrance, 
six  quill-driving  gentlemen  ;  not  gentlemen  whose  duty 
or  profession  it  was  merely  to  drive  the  quill,  but  who 
were  then  driving  it  —  gens  de  plume,  such  171  esse,  as 
well  as  in  posse  —  in  act  as  well  as  habit ;  for,  as  if  they 


70 


LITERARY  BEMINISCENCES. 


supposed  me  a  spy,  sent  by  some  superior  power,  to 
report  upon  the  situation  of  affairs  as  surprised  by  me, 
they  were  all  too  profoundly  immersed  in  their  oriental 
studies  to  have  any  sense  of  my  presence.  Consequently, 
I  was  reduced  to  a  necessity  of  announcing  myself  and 
my  errand.  I  walked,  therefore,  into  one  of  the  two 
open  doorways  of  the  railing,  and  stood  closely  by  the 
high  stool  of  him  who  occupied  the  first  place  within  the 
little  aisle.  I  touched  his  arm,  by  way  of  recalling  him 
from  his  lofty  Leadenhall  speculations  to  this  sublunary 
world  ;  and,  presenting  my  letter,  asked  if  that  gentleman 
(pointing  to  the  address)  were  really  a  citizen  of  the 
present  room  ;  for  I  had  been  repeatedly  misled,  by  the 
directions  given  me,  into  wrong  rooms.  The  gentleman 
smiled  ;  it  was  a  smile  not  to  be  forgotten.  This  was 
Lamb.  And  here  occurred  a  very^  very  little  Incident  — 
one  of  those  which  pass  so  fugitively  that  they  are  gone 
and  hurrying  away  into  Lethe  almost  before  your  atten- 
tion can  have  arrested  them  ;  but  it  was  an  incident  which, 
to  me,  who  happened  to  notice  it,  served  to  express  the 
courtesy  and  delicate  consideration  of  Lamb's  manners. 
The  seat  upon  which  he  sat,  was  a  very  high  one  ;  so 
absurdly  high,  by  the  way,  that  I  can  imagine  no  possible 
use  or  sense  in  such  an  altitude,  unless  it  were  to  restrain 
the  occupant  from  playing  truant  at  the  fire,  by  opposing 
Alpine  difficulties  to  his  descent. 

Whatever  might  be  the  original  purpose  of  this  aspiring 
seat,  one  serious  dilemma  arose  from  it,  and  this  it  was 
which  gave  the  occasion  to  Lamb's  act  of  courtesy. 
Somewhere  there  is  an  anecdote,  meant  to  illustrate  the 
ultra-obsequiousness  of  the  man  :  either  I  have  heard  of 
.t  in  connection  with  some  actual  man  known  to  myself 
01  it  is  told  in  a  book  of  some  historical  coxcomb  —  that 
being  on  horseback,  and  meeting  some  person  or  othei 


EECOLLECTIONS  OF  CHARLES  LAMB.  71 

whom  it  seemed  advisable  to  flatter,  lie  actually  dis- 
mounted, in  order  to  pay  his  court  by  a  more  ceremonious 
bow.  In  Russia,  as  we  all  know,  this  was,  at  one  time, 
upon  meeting  any  of  the  Imperial  family,  an  act  of  legal 
necessity ;  and  there,  accordingly,  but  there  only,  it 
would  have  worn  no  ludicrous  aspect.  Now,  in  this 
situation  of  Lamb's,  the  act  of  descending  from  his 
throne,  a  very  elaborate  process,  with  steps  and  stages 
analogous  to  those  on  horseback  —  of  slipping  your  right 
foot  out  of  the  stirrup,  throwing  your  leg  over  the 
crupper,  &c.  —  was,  to  all  intents  and  purposes,  the  same 
thing  as  dismounting  from  a  great  elephant  of  a  horse. 
Therefore  it  both  was,  and  was  felt  to  be  by  Lamb, 
supremely  ludicrous.  On  the  other  hand,  to  have  sate 
still  and  stately  upon  this  aerial  station,  to  have  bowed 
condescendingly  from  this  altitude,  would  have  been  — 
not  ludicrous  indeed  ;  performed  by  a  very  superb  person, 
and  supported  by  a  very  superb  bow,  it  might  have  been 
vastly  fine,  and  even  terrifying  to  many  young  gentlemen 
under  sixteen  ;  but  it  would  have  had  an  air  of  ungentle- 
manly  assumption.  Between  these  extremes,  therefore, 
Lamb  had  to  choose  :  —  between  appearing  ridiculous 
himself  for  a  moment,  by  going  through  a  ridiculous 
evolution,  which  no  man  could  execute  with  grace  ;  or, 
on  the  other  hand,  appearing  lofty  and  assuming,  in  a 
degree  which  his  truly  humble  nature  (for  he  was  the 
humblest  of  men  in  the  pretensions  which  he  pat  forward 
for  himself)  must  have  shrunk  from  with  horror.  Nobody 
who  knew  Lamb  can  doubt  how  the  problem  was  solved ; 
he  began  to  dismount  instantly  ;  and,  as  it  happened  that 
the  very  first  round  of  his  descent  obliged  him  to  turn  his 
back  upon  me  as  if  for  a  sudden  purpose  of  flight,  he  had 
an  excuse  for  laughing  ;  which  he  did  heartily  —  saying, 
ttt  the  same  time,  something  to  this  efiect,  that  I  must  not 


72 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES, 


judge  from  first  appearances  ;  that  he  should  revolve  upon 
me  ;  that  he  was  not  going  to  fly  ;  and  other  facetiae, 
which  challenged  a  general  laugh  from  the  clerical 
brotherhood. 

When  he  had  reached  the  basis  of  terra  firma  on  which 
I  was  standing,  naturally,  as  a  mode  of  thanking  him  for 
his  courtesy,  I  presented  my  hand  ;  which,  in  a  general 
case,  I  should  certainly  not  have  done  ;  for  I  cherished, 
in  an  ultra-English  degree,  the  English  custom  (a  wise 
custom)  of  bowing  in  frigid  silence  on  a  first  introduction 
to  a  stranger  ;  but,  to  a  man  of  literary  talent,  and  one 
who  had  just  practised  so  much  kindness  in  my  favor  at 
so  probable  a  hazard  to  himself  of  being  laughed  at  for 
his  pains,  I  could  not  maintain  that  frosty  reserve. 
Lamb  took  my  hand  ;  did  not  absolutely  reject  it :  but 
rather  repelled  my  advance  by  his  manner.  This,  how- 
ever, long  afterwards  I  found,  was  only  a  habit  derived 
from  his  too  great  sensitiveness  to  the  variety  of  people's 
feelings,  which  run  through  a  gamut  so  infinite  of  degrees 
and  modes  as  to  make  it  unsafe  for  any  man  who  respects 
himself,  to  be  too  hasty  in  his  allowances  of  familiarity. 
Lamb  had,  as  he  was  entitled  to  have,  a  high  self-respect ; 
and  me  he  probably  suspected  (as  a  young  Oxonian)  of 
some  aristocratic  tendencies.  The  letter  of  introduction, 
containing  (I  imagine)  no  matters  of  business,  was 
speedily  run  through  ;  and  I  instantly  received  an  invita- 
tion to  spend  the  evening  with  him.  Lamb  was  not  one 
of  those  who  catch  at  the  chance  of  escaping  from  a  bore 
by  fixing  some  distant  day,  when  accidents  (in  duplicate 
proportion,  perhaps,  to  the  number  of  intervening  days) 
may  have  carried  you  away  from  the  place  :  he  sought  to 
benefit  by  no  luck  of  that  kind  ;  for  he  was,  with  his 
limited  ii  come  —  and  I  say  it  deliberately  —  positively 
the  most  hospitable  man  I  have  known  in  this  world 


KECOLLECTIONS   OF  CHARLES  LAMB. 


73 


That  night,  the  same  night,  I  was  to  come  and  spend  the 
evening  with  him.  I  had  gone  to  the  India  House  with 
the  express  purpose  of  accepting  whatever  invitation  he 
should  give  me ;  and,  therefore,  I  accepted  this,  took 
my  leave,  and  left  Lamb  in  the  act  of  resuming  his  aerial 
position. 

I  was  to  come  so  early  as  to  drink  tea  with  Lamb  ;  and 
the  hour  was  seven.  He  lived  in  the  Temple  ;  and  I, 
who  was  not  then,  as  afterwards  I  became,  a  student 
and  member  of  '  the  Honorable  Society  of  the  Middle 
Temple,'  did  not  know  much  of  the  localities.  However, 
I  found  out  his  abode,  not  greatly  beyond  my  time : 
nobody  had  been  asked  to  meet  me,  which  a  little  sur- 
prised me,  but  I  was  glad  of  it ;  for,  besides  Lamb,  there 
was  present,  his  sister,  Miss  Lamb,  of  whom,  and  whose 
talents  and  sweetness  of  disposition,  I  had  heard.  I 
turned  the  conversation,  upon  the  first  opening  which 
offeied,  to  the  subject  of  Coleridge  ;  and  many  of  my 
questions  were  answered  satisfactorily,  because  seriously, 
by  Miss  Lamb.  But  Lamb  took  a  pleasure  in  baffling 
me,  or  in  throwing  ridicule  upon  the  subject.  Out  of 
this  grew  the  matter  of  our  affray.  We  were  speaking  of 
*  The  Ancient  Mariner.'  Now  to  explain  what  followed, 
and  a  little  to  excuse  myself,  I  must  beg  the  reader  to 
understand  that  I  was  under  twenty  years  of  age,  and 
that  my  admiration  for  Coleridg,e  (as  in,  perhaps,  a  still 
greater  degree,  for  Wordsworth)  was  literally  in  no 
respect  short  of  a  religious  feeling  :  it  had,  indeed,  all 
the  sanctity  of  religion,  and  all  the  tenderness  of  a 
human  veneration.  Then,  also,  to  imagine  the  strength 
which  it  would  derive  from  circumstances  that  do  not 
exist  now,  but  did  then,  let  the  reader  further  suppose  a 
case  —  not  such  as  he  may  have  known  since  that  era 
about  Sir  Walter  Scotts  and  Lord  Byrons,  where  every 


74  LITERAKY  EEMIK ISCENCES. 

man  you  could  possibly  fall  foul  of,  early  or  late,  night  or 
day,  summer  or  winter,  was  in  perfect  readiness  to  feel 
and  express  his  sympathy  with  the  admirer  —  but  when 
no  man,  beyond  one  or  two  in  each  ten  thousand,  had  so 
much  as  heard  of  either  Coleridge  or  Wordsworth  ;  and 
that  one,  or  those  two,  knew  them  only  to  scorn  them— 
trample  on  them  —  spit  upon  them :  men  so  abj  ect  in 
public  estimation,  I  maintain,  as  that  Coleridge  and  that 
Wordsworth,  had  not  existed  before  —  have  not  existed 
since  —  will  not  exist  again.  We  have  heard  in  old 
times,  of  donkeys  insulting  effete  or  dying  lions,  by 
kicking  them  ;  but  in  the  case  of  Coleridge  and  Words- 
worth it  was  effete  donkeys  that  kicked  living  lions. 
They,  Coleridge  and  Wordsworth,  were  the  Pariahs  of 
literature  in  those  days  :  as  much  scorned  wherever  they 
were  known  ;  but  escaping  that  scorn  only  because  they 
were  as  little  known  as  Pariahs,  and  even  more  obscure. 

Well,  after  this  bravura,  by  way  of  conveying  my 
sense  of  the  real  position  then  occupied  by  these  two 
authors  —  a  position  which  thirty  and  odd  years  have 
altered,  by  a  revolution  more  astonishing  and  total  than 
ever  before  happened  in  literature  or  in  life  —  let  the 
reader  figure  to  himself  the  sensitive  horror  with  which  a 
young  person,  carrying  his  devotion  about  with  him,  of 
necessity,  as  the  profoundest  of  secrets,  like  a  primitive 
Christian  amongst  a  nation  of  Pagans,  or  a  Roman 
Catholic  convert  amongst  the  bloody  idolaters  of  Japan 
—  in  Oxford,  above  all  places,  hoping  for  no  sympathy, 
and  feeling  a  daily  grief,  almost  a  shame,  in  harboring 
this  devotion  to  that  which,  nevertheless,  had  done  more 
for  the  expansion  and  sustenance  of  his  own  inner  mind 
than  all  literature  besides  —  let  the  reader  figure,  I  say, 
to  himself,  the  shock  with  which  such  a  person  must 
recoil  from  hearing  the  very  friend  and  associate  of  these 


RECOLLECTIONS  OF  CHARLES  LAMB. 


75 


autiiors  utter  what  seemed  at  that  time  a  burning  ridicule 
of  all  which  belonged  to  them  —  their  books,  their 
thoughts,  their  places,  their  persons.  This  had  gone  on 
for  some  time,  before  we  came  upon  the  ground  of  '  The 
Ancient  Mariner  ; '  I  had  been  grieved,  perplexed,  aston- 
ished ;  and  how  else  could  I  have  felt  reasonably,  know- 
ing nothing  of  Lamb's  propensity  to  mystify  a  stranger  ; 
he,  on  the  other  hand,  knowing  nothing  of  the  depth  of 
my  feelings  on  these  subjects,  and  that  they  were  not  so 
much  mere  literary  preferences  as  something  that  went 
deeper  than  life  or  household  affections?  At  length, 
when  he  had  given  utterance  to  some  ferocious  canon  of 
judgment,  which  seemed  to  question  the  entire  value  of 
the  poem,  I  said,  perspiring,  (I  dare  say,)  in  this  detesta- 
ble crisis  — '  But,  Mr.  Lamb,  good  heavens  !  how  is  it 
possible  you  can  allow  yourself  in  such  opinions?  What 
instance  could  you  bring  from  the  poem  that  would  bear 
you  out  in  these  insinuations  ? '  '  Instance3  ! '  said  Lamb  : 
*  oh,  I'll  instance  you,  if  you  come  to  that.  Instance, 
indeed  !    Pray,  what  do  you  say  to  this  — 

**  The  many  men  so  beautiful, 
And  they  all  dead  did  lie  ?  " 

So  beautiful,  indeed  !  Beautiful !  Just  think  of  such  a 
gang  of  Wapping  vagabonds,  all  covered  with  pitch,  and 
chewing  tobacco  ;  and  the  old  gentleman  himself —  what 
do  you  call  him  ?  —  the  bright- eyed  fellow  ?  '  What 
more  might  follow,  I  never  heard  ;  for,  at  this  point,  in 
^  perfect  rapture  of  horror,  1  raised  my  hands  —  both 
hands  —  to  both  ears  ;  and,  without  stopping  to  think  or 
Jo  apologize,  I  endeavored  to  restore  equanimity  to  my 
disturbed  sensibilities,  by  shutting  out  all  further  knowl- 
edge of  Lamb's  impieties.  At  length  he  seemed  to  have 
finished ;  so  I,  on  my  part,  thought  I  might  venture  to 


76 


XITEEAEY  HEMINISCENCES. 


take  ojff  the  embargo  :  and  in  fact  he  had  ceased  ^  but 
no  sooner  did  he  find  me  restored  to  my  hearing  than  he 
said  with  a  most  sarcastic  smile  —  which  he  could 
assume  upon  occasion  — '  If  you  please,  sir,  we'll  say 
grace  before  we  begin.'  I  know  not  whether  Lamb 
were  really  piqued  or  not  at  the  mode  by  which  I  had 
expressed  my  disturbance  :  Miss  Lamb  certainly  was  not : 
her  goodness  led  her  to  pardon  me,  and  to  treat  me  —  in 
whatever  light  she  might  really  view  my  almost  involun- 
tary rudeness  —  as  the  party  who  had  suffered  wrong  ; 
and,  for  the  rest  of  the  evening,  she  was  so  pointedly 
kind  and  conciliatory  in  her  ipanner,  that  I  felt  greatly 
ashamed  of  my  boyish  failure  in  self-command.  Yet, 
after  all,  Lamb  necessarily  appeared  so  much  worse,  in 
my  eyes,  as  a  traitor  is  worse  than  an  open  enemy. 

Lamb,  after  this  one  visit  —  not  knowing  at  that  time 
any  particular  reason  for  continuing  to  seek  his  acquaint- 
ance —  I  did  not  trouble  with  my  calls  for  some  years. 
At  length,  however,  about  the  year  1808,  and  for  the 
six  or  seven  following  years,  in  my  evening  visits  to 
Coleridge,  I  used  to  meet  him  again ;  not  often,  but 
sufficiently  to  correct  altogether  the  very  false  impression 
I  had  received  of  his  character  and  manners.  I  have 
elsewhere  described  him  as  a  '  Diogenes  with  the  heart  of 
a  St.  John'  —  where,  by  the  way,  the  reader  must  not, 
by  laying  the  accent  falsely  on  St.  John,  convert  it  into 
the  name  of  Lord  Bolingbroke  :  I  meant  St.  John  the 
FiVangelist.  And  by  ascribing  to  Lamb  any  sort  of 
kiesemblance  to  Diogenes,  I  had  a  view  only  to  his  plain 
speaking  in  the  first  place  —  his  unequalled  freedom  from 
every  mode  of  hypocrisy  or  affectation ;  and,  secondly, 
to  his  talent  for  saying  keen,  pointed  things,  sudden 
flashes,  or  revelations  of  hidden  truths,  in  a  short  con- 
densed form  of  words.    In  ^act,  the  very  foundation  of 


EECOIiLECTIONS  OF  CHARLES  LAMB.  77 

Lamb's  peculiar  character  was  laid  in  his  absolute  abhor- 
rence of  all  affectation.  This  showed  itself  in  self- 
disparagemeni  of  every  kind;  never  the  mock  disparage- 
ment, which  IS  self-praise  in  an  indirect  form,  as  when 
people  accuse  themselves  of  all  the  virtues,  by  professing 
an  inability  to  pay  proper  attention  to  prudence  or 
economy  —  or  uncontrollable  disposition  to  be  rash  and 
inconsiderate  on  behalf  of  a  weaker  party  when  suffering 
apparent  wrong.  But  Lamb's  confessions  of  error,  of 
infirmity,  were  never  at  any  time  acts  of  mock  humility, 
meant  to  involve  oblique  compliment  in  the  rebound. 
Thus,  he  honestly  and  frankly  confessed  his  blank  insen- 
sibility to  music. 

*  King  David's  harp,  that  made  the  madness  flee 
From  Saul,  had  been  but  a  Jew's  harp  to  me,' 

is  his  plain,  unvarnished  admission,  in  verses  admirable 
for  their  wit  and  their  elegance  :  nor  did  he  attempt  to 
break  the  force  of  this  unfortunate  truth,  by  claiming, 
which,  perhaps,  he  might  have  claimed,  a  compensatory 
superiority  in  the  endowments  of  his  eye.  It  happened 
to  him,  as  I  believe  it  has  often  done  to  others  —  to  Pope, 
perhaps,  but  certainly  to  Wordsworth  —  that  the  imperfect 
structure  or  imperfect  development  of  the  ear,  denying 
any  profound  sensibility  to  the  highest  modes  of  im- 
passioned music,  has  been  balanced  by  a  more  than  usual 
lensibility  to  some  modes  of  visual  beauty. 

With  respect  to  Wordsworth,  it  has  been  doubted,  by 
some  of  his  friends,  upon  very  good  grounds,  whether,  as 
a  connoisseur  in  painting,  he  has  a  very  learned  eye,  or 
one  that  can  be  relied  upon.  I  hold  it  to  be  very  doubt- 
.ul,  also,  whether  Wordsworth's  judgment  in  the  human 
face  —  its  features  and  its  expression  —  be  altogether 
found,  and  in  confoimity  to  the  highest  standards  of  art. 


78 


LITEBARY  REMINISCENCES. 


But  it  is  undeniable  —  and  must  be  most  familiar  to  all 
who  have  associated  upon  intimate  terms  with  Wordsworth 
and  his  sister  —  that  they  both  derive  a  pleasure,  origin- 
ally and  organically  more  profound  than  is  often  witnessed, 
both  from  the  forms  and  the  coloring  of  rural  nature. 
The  very  same  tests  by  which  I  recognize  my  own 
sensibility  to  music,  as  rising  above  the  common  standard 
—  viz.,  by  the  indispensableness  of  it  to  my  daily  com- 
fort :  the  readiness  with  which  I  make  any  sacrifices  to 
obtain  a  '  grand  debauch '  of  this  nature,  dec.  &:c.  — 
these,  when  applied  to  Wordsworth,  manifest  him  to  have 
an  analogous  craving,  in  a  degree  much  transcending  the 
general  ratio  for  the  luxuries  of  the  eye.  These  luxuries 
Wordsworth  seeks  in  their  great  original  exemplar  —  in 
Nature  as  exhibiting  herself  amongst  the  bold  forms  and 
the  rich  but  harmonious  coloring  of  mountainous  scenery ; 
there  especially,  where  the  hand  of  injudicious  art,  or  of 
mercenary  craft,  has  not  much  interfered,  with  monoto- 
nous repetition  of  unmeaning  forms  with  offensive  outlines, 
or,  still  more,  with  harsh  and  glaring  contrasts  of  color. 
The  offence  which  strikes  upon  Wordsworth's  eye  from 
such  disfigurations  of  nature  is,  really  and  without  affecta- 
tion, as  keen,  as  intense,  and  as  inevitable  as  to  other 
men  the  pain  to  the  mere  physical  eye-sight  from  the 
glare  of  snow  or  the  irritations  of  flying  dust.  Lamb,  on 
the  other  hand,  sought  his  pleasures  of  this  class  —  not, 
as  by  this  time  all  the  world  knows,  in  external  nature, 
for  which  it  was  his  pleasure  to  profess,  not  merely  an 
indifference,  but  even  a  horror  which  it  delighted  him  to 
exaggerate  with  a  kind  of  playful  malice  to  those  whom 
he  was  hoaxing  —  but  in  the  works  of  the  great  painters  : 
and  for  these  I  have  good  reason  to  think  that  both  he  and 
his  sister  had  a  peculiarly  deep  sensibility,  and,  after  long 
practice,  a  fine  and  matured  taste.    Here,  then,  was  botV 


RECOLLECTIONS  OF  CHARLES  LAMB.  79 

%  gift  and  an  attainment  which  Lamb  might  have  fairly 
pleaded  in  the  way  of  a  set-off  to  his  acknowledged  de- 
fects of  ear.  But  Lamb  was  too  really  and  sincerely 
humble  ever  to  think  of  nursing  and  tending  his  own 
character  in  any  man's  estimation,  or  of  attempting  to 
blunt  the  effect  of  his  own  honest  avowals  of  imperfection, 
by  dexterously  playing  off  before  your  eyes  some  coun- 
terbalancing accomplishment.  He  was,  in  fact,  as  I  have 
said  before,  the  most  humble  and  unpretending  of  human 
beings,  the  most  thoroughly  sincere,  the  most  impatient 
of  either  simulation  or  dissimulation,  and  the  one  who 
threw  himself  the  most  unreservedly  for  your  good  opinion 
upon  the  plain  natural  expression  of  his  real  qualities,  as 
nature  had  forced  them,  without  artifice,  or  design,  or 
disguise,  more  than  you  find  in  the  most  childlike  of 
children. 

There  was  a  notion  prevalent  about  Lamb,  which  I  can 
affirm  to  have  been  a  most  erroneous  one  :  it  was  —  that 
any  flagrant  act  of  wickedness  formed  a  recommendation 
to  his  favor.  '  Ah  ! '  said  one  man  to  me,  when  asking 
a  letter  of  introduction  from  him  —  '  ah  !  that  I  could  but 
recommend  you  as  a  man  that  had  robbed  the  mail,  or  the 
King's  exchequer  —  which  would  be  better.  In  that  case, 
I  need  not  add  a  word  ;  you  would  take  rank  instantly 
amongst  the  privileged  friends  of  Lamb,  without  a  word 
from  me.'  Now,  as  to  '  the  King's  Exchequer,'  I  cannot 
say.  A  man  who  should  have  placed  himself  in  relation 
with  Falstaff,  by  obeying  his  commands  *  at  a  distance  of 
four  centuries,  (like  the  traveller,  who  demanded  of  the 
'urnpikeman  — '  How  do  you  like  your  eggs  dressed?' 
tnd,  ten  years  after,  on  passing  the  same  gate,  received 
the  monosyllabic  reply — poached)  —  that   man  might 

♦•Rob  me  thy  father's  exchequer.'  —  Falstaff,  in  Henry  IV t 
Fart  l«t 


LITERAKT  REMINISCENCES. 


have  presented  irresistible  claims  to  Lamb's  affection. 
Shakspeare,  or  anything  connected  with  Shakspeare^ 
might  have  proved  too  much  for  his  Roman  virtue.  But, 
putting  aside  any  case  so  impossible  as  this,  I  can  affirm 
that  —  so  far  from  this  being  the  truth,  or  approaching 
the  truth  —  a  rule  the  very  opposite  governed  Lamb's 
conduct :  —  so  far  from  welcoming  wicked,  profligate,  or 
dissolute  people  by  preference,  if  they  happened  to  be 
clever  —  he  bore  with  numerous  dull  people,  stupid  peo* 
pie,  asinine  people,  for  no  other  reason  upon  earth  than 
^because  he  knew  them,  or  believed  them  to  have  been 
ill-used  or  oppressed  by  some  clever  but  dissolute  man. 
That  was  enough.  Sufficient  it  was  that  they  had  been 
the  objects  of  injustice,  calumny,  persecution,  or  wrong 
in  any  shape  —  and,  without  further  question,  they  had 
'  their  place  allowed  '  at  Lamb's  fireside.  I  knew  some 
eminent  instances  of  what  I  am  now  saying.  And  I  used 
to-think  to  myself.  Were  this  feature  of  Lamb's  character 
made  known,  and  the  natural  results  followed,  what  would 
he  do  ?  Refuse  anybody,  reject  anybody,  tell  him  to 
begone,  he  could  not,  no  more  than  he  could  have  danced 
upon  his  mother's  grave.  He  would  have  received  all 
who  presented  themselves  with  any  rational  pretensions  ; 
and  would  finally  have  gone  to  prison  rather  than  reject 
anybody.  I  do  not  say  this  rhetorically.  I  knew  Lamb ; 
and  I  know  certain  cases  in  which  he  was  concerned  — 
cases  which  it  is  difficult  to  publish  with  any  regard  to  the 
%elings  of  persons  now  living,  but  which  (if  published  in 
•u,ll  their  circumstances)  would  show  him  to  be  the  very 
noblest  of  human  beings.  He  was  a  man,  in  a  sense 
more  eminent  than  would  be  conceivable  by  many  people, 
princely  —  nothing  short  of  that  in  his  beneficence.  Many 
liberal  people  I  have  known  in  this  world  —  many  who 
were  charitable  in  the  widest  sense  —  many  munificent 


RECOLLECTIONS  OF  CHABLES  LAMB.  81 

people  ;  but  never  any  one  upon  whom,  for  bounty,  for 
indulgence  and  forgiveness,  for  charitable  construction  of 
doubtful  or  mixed  actions,  and  for  regal  munificence,  you 
might  have  thrown  yourself  with  so  absolute  a  reliance  as 
upon  this  comparatively  poor  Charles  Lamb.  Considered 
as  a  man  of  genius,  he  was  not  in  the  very  first  rank, 
simply  because  his  range  was  a  contracted  one :  within 
that  range,  he  was  perfect ;  of  the  peculiar  powers  which 
he  possessed,  he  has  left  to  the  world  as  exquisite  a 
specimen  as  this  planet  is  likely  to  exhibit.  But,  as  a 
moral  being,  in  the  total  compass  of  his  relations  to  thiSv 
world's  duties,  in  the  largeness  and  diff'usiveness  of  his 
charity,  in  the  graciousness  of  his  condescension  to  in- 
ferior intellects,  I  am  disposed,  after  a  deliberate  review 
of  my  own  entire  experience,  to  pronounce  him  the  best 
man,  the  nearest  in  his  approaches  to  an  ideal  standard  of 
excellence,  that  I  have  known  or  read  of.  In  the  mingled 
purity  —  a  childlike  purity  —  and  the  benignity  of  his 
nature,  I  again  express  my  own  deep  feeling  of  the  truth, 
when  I  say  that  he  recalled  to  my  mind  the  image  and 
character  of  St.  John  the  Evangelist  —  of  him  who  was 
at  once  the  beloved  apostle,  and  also,  more  peculiarly,  the 
apostle  of  love.  Well  and  truly,  therefore,  did  the  poet 
say,  in  his  beautiful  lines  upon  this  man's  grave  and 
memory  — 

*  Oh,  he  was  good,  if  e'er  a  good  man  lived  ! '  * 

♦  One  feature  there  was  in  Lamb's  charity,  which  is  but  too  fre- 
|uently  found  wanting  amongst  the  most  liberal  and  large-hearted 
of  the  charitable,  and  especially  where  the  natural  temper  is  melan- 
choly or  desponding  ;  one,  moreover,  which,  beyond  any  other  aspect 
of  charity,  wears  a  winning  grace  —  one,  finally,  which  is  indistinctly 
pointed  out  as  a  duty  in  our  scriptural  code  of  ethics  —  the  habit  of 
\oping  cheerfully  and  kindly  on  behalf  of  those  who  were  otherwise 
•bjects  of  moral  blame.  Lamb,  if  anybody,  plagued  as  he  was  by  a 
6 


62 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


Perhaps  the  foundation  for  the  false  notion  I  have 
mentioned  about  Lamb's  predilections,  was  to  be  found  in 

constitutional  taint  of  morbid  melancholy,  might  have  been  privileged 
to  fail  in  this  duty  ;  but  he  did  not.  His  goodness,  making  it  too 
painful  to  him  to  cherish  as  final  conclusions  any  opinions  with 
regard  to  any  individual  which  seemed  to  shut  him  out  from  the 
sympathy  or  the  brotherly  feeling  of  the  just  and  good,  overpowered 
the  acuteness  of  his  discernment ;  and  where  it  was  quite  impossible 
to  find  matter  of  approbation  in  the  past  or  the  present  conduct,  he 
would  turn  to  the  future  for  encouraging  views  of  amendment,  and 
would  insist  upon  regarding  what  was  past,  as  the  accidental  irregu- 
larity, the  anomaly,  the  exception,  warranting  no  inferences  with 
regard  to  what  remained  ;  and  (whenever  that  was  possible)  would 
charge  it  all  upon  unfortunate  circumstances.  Everybody  must  have 
felt  the  profound  pathos  of  that  passage  in  scripture  —  *  Let  him  that 
stole y  ileal  no  more  ;  *  a  pathos  which  rests  evidently  upon  the  sud- 
den substitution  for  a  judicial  sentence  proportioned  to  the  offence, 
(such  as  an  ordinary  lawgiver  would  have  uttered,  and  such  as  the 
listener  anticipates,)  of  a  heavenly  light  opened  upon  the  guilty 
heart,  showing  to  it  a  hope  and  an  escape,  and  whispering  that  for 
itself  also  there  may  be  final  peace  in  reversion,  where  otherwise  all 
had  seemed  blank  despair  and  the  darkness  of  coming  vengeance. 
The  poor  benighted  Pariah  of  social  life  —  who  durst  not  so  much  as 
lift  up  his  eyes  to  heaven,  and,  by  the  angry  tone  of  human  laws,  as 
well  as  of  society  in  general,  finds  but  too  much  that  disposes  him  to 
despond,  and  perhaps  makes  no  effort,  merely  because  all  efforts  seem 
Ukely  to  be  unavailing  —  will  often,  in  the  simple  utterance  of  a 
cheerful  hope  on  his  behalf,  see  as  it  were  a  window  opening  in 
heaven,  and  faces  radiant  with  promise  looking  out  upon  him.  These 
words  I  mean  to  apply  as  the  distinguishing  description  of  Christian 
ethics,  as  contrasted  with  all  other  ethical  theories.  For  it  is  a  just 
inquiry  with  respect  to  any  system  of  morals  —  not  merely,  What 
ttre  your  substantial  doctrines,  what  is  the  corpus  of  your  laws  ?  — 
but  also.  What  is  your  preparatory  discipline  ?  —  what  are  the  mean4 
at  your  disposal  for  winning  over  the  reluctant  disciple,  the  bold 
recusant,  or  the  timid  doubter  ?  And  it  is  worthy  of  remark  that, 
in  this  case  of  hoping  on  behalf  of  those  who  did  seem  no  just  objects 
)f  hope  —  the  very  same  absence  of  all  compromise  with  human 
infirmity  is  found,  which  a  distinguished  German  infidel  described 


RECOLLECTIONS  OF  CHABLES  LAMB.  83 


his  carelessness  for  those  social  proscriptions  whicli  have 
sometimes  occurred  in  our  stormy  times  with  respect  to 
writers,  male  and  female,  who  set  the  dominant  notions, 
or  the  prevailing  feelings  of  men  —  (feelings  with  regard 
to  sexual  proprieties,  to  social  distinctions,  to  the  sanctity 
of  property,  to  the  sanctity  of  religious  formulae,  &c.  &c.) 
—  at  open  defiance.  Take,  for  example,  Thelwall,  at 
one  time,  Holcroft,  Godwin,  Mrs.  Wolstonecraft,  Dr. 
Priestley,  Hazlitt,  all  of  whom  were,  more  or  less,  in  a 
backward  or  inverse  sense,  tabooed  —  that  is,  consecrated 

the  great  distinction  of  Christianity,  and  one  which  raised  it  primd 
facie  above  all  other  codes  of  morality.  There  is  indeed  a  descent  — 
a  condescension  to  humanity  and  its  weakness  ;  but  no  shadow  of  a 
compromise  —  a  capitulation  —  or  what  in  Roman  law  is  called  a 
*  transaction '  with  it.  For,  said  Iramanuel  Kant,  here  lies  the 
point :  —  the  Stoic  maintains  the  moral  principle  in  its  ideal  purity  ; 
be  sacrifices  nothing  at  all  to  human  weakness :  and  so  far  he 
deserves  praise.  But  then,  for  that  same  reason,  he  is  useless :  his 
standard  is  exalted  beyond  all  human  reproach.  On  the  other  hand, 
the  Epicurean  relaxes  so  far  as  to  make  his  method  of  *  holiness ' 
attainable.  But  how  ?  It  is  by  debasing  and  lowering  the  standard. 
Each,  therefore,  in  a  different  sense,  and  for  different  reasons,  is 
useless  to  human  nature  as  it  is.  Now  comes  Christianity,  and  effects 
a  synthesis  of  all  which  is  good  in  each,  while  she  purifies  herself 
from  all  taint  of  what  is  evil.  She  presents  a  standard  of  holiness 
a  *  maximum  perfectionis,'  (as  the  scholastic  phrase  is,)  no  less  exr 
alted,  no  less  jealous  of  all  earthly  taint  or  soil,  than  Stoicism.  This, 
however,  she  makes  accessible  to  man  :  not  by  any  compromise  or 
adaptation  of  its  demands  to  a  lower  nature  ;  but  by  means  peculiarly 
her  own  —  by  promise  of  supernatural  aid.  Thus  she  is  celestial 
Lke  the  one,  and  terrestrial  like  the  other,  but  by  such  a  reconcilia- 
tion as  celestial  means  only  could  effect.  This  Kant  allowed  to 
constitute  a  philosophic  character  for  Christianity,  which  offered 
itself  at  the  very  vestibule.  And  in  this  function  of  hope,  as  one 
which  is  foremost  amongst  the  functions  of  charity,  there  is  the  very 
same  harmony  of  rigor  in  the  judge,  and  loyalty  to  the  standarij 
erected,  with  human  condescension  and  consideration  for  the  crim 


84 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


to  public  hatred  and  scorn  —  with  respect  to  ail  these 
persons,  feeling  that  the  public  alienation  had  gone  too 
far,  or  had  begun  originally  upon  false  grounds,  Lamb 
threw  his  heart  and  his  doors  wide  open.  Politics  —  what 
cared  he  for  politics  ?  Religion  —  in  the  sense  of  theolo- 
gical dogmas  —  what  cared  he  for  religion  ?  For  religion 
in  its  moral  aspects,  and  its  relations  to  the  heart  of  man 
no  human  being  ever  cared  more.  '  With  respect  to 
politics,  some  of  his  friends  could  have  wished  him  to 
hate  men  when  they  grew  anti-national,  and  in  that  case 
only  ;  bi  t  he  would  not.  He  persisted  in  liking  men  who 
made  an  idol  of  Napoleon,  who  sighed  over  the  dread 
name  of  Waterloo,  and  frowned  upon  Trafalgar.  There 
I  thought  him  wrong ;  but,  in  that,  as  one  of  my  guar- 
dians used  to  say  of  me,  he  '  followed  his  own  devil ; ' 
though,  after  all,  I  believe  he  took  a  secret  silent  pleasure 
in  the  grandeur  of  his  country,  and  would  have  suffered 
in  her  suffering  —  would  have  been  humiliated  in  her 
humiliation  —  more  than  he  altogether  acknowledged  to 
himself ;  in  fact,  his  carelessness  grew  out  of  the  depth  of 
his  security.  He  could  well  afford  to  be  free  of  anxiety 
in  a  case  like  this  ;  for  the  solicitudes  of  jealous  affection,, 
the  tremulous  and  apprehensive  love,  as  '  of  a  mother  or. 
a  child,'  (which  painful  mood  of  love  Wordsworth  pro- 
fesses for  his  country,  but  only  in  a  wayward  fit  of 
passion,)  could  scarcely  be  thought  applicable,  even  in 
the  worst  days  of  Napoleon,  to  a  national  grandeur  and. 
power  which  seem  as  little  liable  to  chance  or  change,  as. 
essentially  unapproachable  by  any  serious  impeachment, 
as  the  principle  of  gravitation  or  the  composition  of  the 
air.  Why,  therefore,  should  he  trouble  himself  more 
about  the  nice  momentary  oscillations  of  the  national 
fortunes  in  war  or  council,,  more  than  about  adjusting  hi* 
balance,  so  as  not  to  disturb  the  equilibrium  of  the  earth 


RECOLXECTIONS  OF  CHAELES  LAMB.  ft5 

Theie  was  anotlier  trait  of  character  about  Charles 
Lamb,  wbicli  might  have  countenanced  the  common 
notion  that  he  looked  indulgently  upon  dissolute  men,  or 
men  notorious  for  some  criminal  escapade.  This  was 
his  thorough  hatred  of  all  hypocrisy,  and  his  practical 
display  of  that  hatred  on  all  possible  occasions.  Even  in 
a  point  so  foreign,  as  it  might  seem,  from  this  subject  as 
his  style,  though  chiefly  founded  upon  his  intellectual 
differences  and  his  peculiar  taste,  the  prevailing  tone  of  it 
was  in  part  influenced  (or  at  least  sustained)  by  his 
disgust  for  all  which  transcended  tke  naked  simplicity  of 
truth.  This  is  a  deep  subject,  with  as  many  faces,  ot 
facets^  (to  speak  the  language  of  jewellers,)  as  a  rose-cut 
diamond  ;  and  far  be  it  from  me  to  say  one  word  in  praise 
of  those  —  people  of  how  narrow  a  sensibility  !  —  who 
imagine  that  a  simple  (that  is,  according  to  many  tastes^ 
an  unelevated  and  unrhythmical)  style  —  take,  for  instance, 
an  Addisonian  or  a  Swiftian  style  —  is  unconditionally 
good.  Not  so  :  all  depends  upon  the  subject ;  and  there 
is  a  style,  transcending  these  and  all  other  modes  of 
simplicity,  by  infinite  degrees,  and,  in  the  same  propor- 
tion, impossible  to  most  men  —  the  rhythmical  —  the 
continuous  —  what,  in  French,  is  called  the  soutenu^ 
which,  to  humbler  styles,  stands  in  the  relation  of  an 
organ  to  a  shepherd's  pipe.  This  also  finds  its  justifica- 
tion in  its  subject ;  and  the  subject  which  can  justify  it 
must  be  of  a  corresponding  quality  —  loftier  —  and,  there- 
fore, rare. 

If,  then,  in  style  —  so  indirect  an  expression  as  thai 
must  be  considered  of  his  nature  and  moral  feelings  — 
how  much  more,  in  their  direct  and  conscious  expressions, 
was  Lamb  impatient  of  hypocrisf  !  Hypocrisy  may  be 
considered  as  the  heroic  form  of  affectation.  Now,  th« 
very  basis  of  Lamb's  character  was  laid  in  downright 


66 


/.ITERAKY  REMINISCENCES. 


horror  of  affectation.  If  he  found  himself  by  accident 
using  a  rather  fine  word,  notwithstanding  it  might  be  the 
most  forcible  in  that  place,  (the  word  arrest,  suppose,  in 
certain  situations,  for  the  word  catchy)  he  would,  if  it  were 
allowed  to  stand,  make  merry  with  his  own  grandilo- 
quence at  the  moment ;  and,  in  after  moments,  he  would 
continually  ridicule  that  class  of  words,  by  others  carried 
to  an  extreme  of  pedantry  —  the  word  '  arride^  for 
instance,  used  in  the  sense  of  pleasing,  or  winning  the 
approhation — just  as  Charles  Fox,  another  patron  of 
simplicity,  or,  at  least,  of  humility  in  style  was  accus- 
tomed to  use  the  word  '  vilipend,^  as  a  standing  way  of 
sarcastically  recalling  to  the  reader's  mind  the  Latinizing 
writers  of  English.  Hence  —  that  is,  from  this  intense 
sincerity  and  truth  of  character  —  Lamb  would  allow 
himself  to  say  things  that  shocked  the  feelings  of  the 
company  —  shocked  sometimes  in  the  sense  of  startling 
or  electrifying,  as  by  something  that  was  odd  ;  but  also 
sometimes  shocked  with  the  sense  of  what  w^as  revolting, 
as  by  a  Swiftian  laying  bare  of  naked  shivering  human 
nature.  Such  exposures  of  masquerading  vanity  —  such 
surgical  probings  and  vexings  of  the  secret  feelings  —  I 
have  seen  almost  truculently  pursued  by  Lamb.  He 
seemed  angry  and  fierce  in  such  cases  only ;  but  the 
anger  was  for  the  aflTectation  and  insincerity,  which  he 
could  not  endure,  unless  where  they  covered  some  shame 
or  timidity,  never  where  they  were  masks  for  attacking  an 
individual.  The  case  of  insincerity,  above  all  others, 
which  moved  his  bile,  was  where,  out  of  some  pretended 
homage  to  public  decorum,  an  individual  was  run  down 
on  account  of  any  moral  infirmities,  such  as  we  all  have, 
or  have  had,  or  at  least  so  easily  and  naturally  may  have 
had,  that  nobody  knows  whether  we  have  them  or  not 
such  a  case,  and  in  this  only  almost.  Lamb  could  b6 


RECOLLECTIONS  OF   CHAHLES  LAMB.  87 

savage  in  his  manner.  I  remember  one  instance,  where 
many  of  the  leading  authors  of  our  age  were  assembled 

—  Coleridge,  Wordsworth,    Southey,  &c.    Lamb  was 

amongst  tbem  ;  and  when  was  denounced  as  a  man 

careless  in  the  education  of  his  children,  and  generally 
reputed  to  lead  a  licentious  life  —  Pretty  fellows  we  are,' 
said  Lamb,  '  to  abuse  him  on  that  last  score,  when  every 
one  of  us,  I  suppose,  on  going  out  this  night  into  the 
Strand,  will  make  up  to  the  first  pretty  girl  he  sees.' 
Some  laughed  —  some  looked  grim  —  some  looked  grand 

—  but  Wordsworth,  smiling,  and  yet  with  solemnity,  said 

—  I  hope,  I  trust,  Mr.  Lamb,  you  are  mistaken,  or,  at 
least,  you  do  not  include  us  all  in  this  sweeping  judg- 
ment ?  '  '  Oh,  as  to  that,'  said  Lamb,  '  who  knows  ? 
There's  no  telling  :  sad  Josephs  are  some  of  us  in  this 
very  room.'  Upon  which  everybody  laughed,  and  Lamb 
amongst  them  ;  but  he  had  been  indignant  and  sincere  in 
this  rebuke  of  the  hypocritical  sacrifice  to  decorum.  He 
manifested  a  fervor  of  feeling  in  such  cases ;  not  of 
anger  primarily  to  the  assailant  —  that  was  but  a  reaction 

—  his  fervor  was  a  movement  of  intense  and  conscien- 
tious justice  towards  the  person  assailed,  as  in  one  who 
felt  that  he  himself,  if  not  by  the  very  same  trespasses, 
had  erred  and  was  liable  to  err ;  that  he  also  was  a 
brother  in  human  infirmity,  and  a  debtor  to  the  frailty  of 
all  flesh,  though  not  possibly  by  the  same  overt  acts  or 
habits. 

In  reviewing  the  life  of  Lamb,  it  is  almost  inevitable 
that,  to  a  reader  not  specially  acquainted  with  its  events 
beyond  what  Serjeant  Talfourd  has  judged  it  proper  to 
communicate,  many  things  will  appear  strange  and  unex- 
plained. In  a  copy  of  the  Serjeant  s  work,  now  lying 
before  me,  which  had  been  borrowed  for  my  use  from  a 
distinguished  literary  lady,  I  find  a  pencil  mark  of  inter- 


88 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


rogation  attached  to  the  word  *  chequered^'  by  which,  at 
p.  334,  Vol.  11. ,  Lamb's  life  is  characterized.  This  is  a 
natural  expression  of  surprise,  under  the  suppressions 
which  have  been  here  practised  ;  suppressions  dictated 
alike  by  delicacy  for  what  is  too  closely  personal,  and  by 
reverential  pity  for  what  is  too  afflicting.  Still  it  will  be 
asked  by  those  who  read  attentively,  In  what  sense  was 
Lamb's  life  chequered  ?  As  Wordsworth  has  scattered 
repeated  allusions  to  this  subject  in  his  fine  memorial 
verses  on  Lamb,  allusions  which  must,  for  the  present,  be 
almost  unintelligible  to  the  great  majority  of  readers  ; 
and,  as  he  has  done  this,  notwithstanding  he  was  perfectly 
aware  at  the  time  of  the  Serjeant's  reserve,  and  aware 
also  that  this  reserve  was  not  accidental,  professing  him- 
self, moreover,  to  be 

•  Awed  by  the  theme's  peculiar  sanctity, 
Which  words  less  free, 

(viz.  the  prose  narrative  of  Lamb's  biographer,  which 
wanted,  of  necessity,  the  impassioned  tenderness  oi  a 
poetic  memorial,) 

« Presumed  not  even  to  touch; 

under  these  circumstances  it  may  be  right,  whilst  still 
persisting  in  not  raising  that  veil  which  has  been  dropped 
over  this  subject  by  Serjeant  Talfourd,  out  of  profound 
feelings  for  the  surviving  lady  of  the  family,  that  sister  of 
Charles  Lamb,  who  presented  so  much  of  his  own  genius 
and  his  own  disposition,  through  a  softmed  or  lunar 
reflection,  and  who  was  the  great  consoler  of  his  afflictiou 
that  sister, 

•  The  meek 
The  self-restraining,  and  the  ever  kind. 
In  whom  hU  reason  and  intelligent  heart 


11EC0LXF($TI0NS  0¥  CHARIiES  LAMB.  89 


Found  —  for  all  interests,  hopes,  and  tender  cares, 
All  softening,  humanizing,  hallowing  powers. 
Whether  withheld  or  for  her  sake  unsought  — 
More  than  sufficient  recompense  * '  — 

Btill  persisting,  I  say,  out  of  veneration  for  this  admirable 
lady,  in  refusing  to  raise  the  veil,  it  may  yet  be  lawful  so 
far  to  assist  the  reader  in  penetrating  its  folds,  as  that  be 
may  apprehend  the  main  features  of  the  case,  in  a  degree 
sufficient  for  the  application  of  Wordsworth's  else  partly 
unintelligible  verses ;  and  the  more  so,  for  these  two 
reasons  :  —  1st,  That  several  passages  in  these  verses  are 
calculated,  at  any  rate,  to  pique  the  curiosity,  although 
they  do  not  satisfy  it ;  2dly,  (which  must  especially  be 
remembered,)  A  mere  interest  of  curiosity,  curiosity 
vulgar  and  disrespectful,  cannot  be  imagined  in  this  case. 
A  curiosity  which  put  the  question  suggested  by  the  word 
chequered^  and  absolutely  challenged  by  Wordsworth's 
verses,  must  be  already  one  that  has  been  hallowed  and 
refined  by  a  tender  interest  in  the  subject ;  since  no 
interest  short  of  that,  could  have  attracted  a  reader  to  a 
life  so  poor  in  anecdote,  or  any  other  vulgai'  allurements, 
or,  at  least,  no  other  could  have  detained  him  sufficiently 
upon  its  circumstantial  parts,  to  allow  of  his  raising  the 
question. 

To  approach  this  question,  therefore,  in  the  most  proper 
way,  perhaps  the  very  same  verses  of  Wordsworth,  which 
lire  amongst  the  parts  of  the  Serjeant's  book  most  fitted 
to  suggest  the  question,  are  most  fitted  to  suggest  the 
answer.  Being  read  carefully,  without  which  they  will 
do  neither  the  one  nor  the  other,  they  indicate  their  own 
commentary.  One  of  the  most  beautiful  passages,  and,  at 
the  same  time,  of  the  most  significant,  is  this :  — 

•  Thus,  'mid  a  shifting  world. 
Did  they  together  testify  of  time 


90 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


Aad  season's  difference  —  a  double  tree, 

With  two  collateral  stems  sprung  from  one  root; 

Such  were  they  —  such  through  life  they  might  have  been. 

In  union,  in  partition  only  such  : 

Otherwise  wrought  the  will  of  the  Most  High.' 

They  might  have  exhibited  the  image  of  a  double  tree, 
in  union  throughout  their  joint  lives. ^  Diis  aliter  visum 
est.  And  then  the  poet  goes  on  to  shadow  forth  their  real 
course  through  this  world,  and  to  hint  at  the  sad  cause 
which  occasionally  separated  them,  under  the  image  of 
two  ships  launched  jointly,  and  for  the  same  voyage  of 
discovery  —  viewing  each  other,  therefore,  as  partners 
pursuing  common  objects,  under  common  hazards  and 
difficulties  —  often  divided  by  stress  of  weather,  often  re- 
joining each  other  at  the  fixed  place  of  rendezvous,  again 
to  be  separated,  and  again  to  be  reunited  :  — 

*  Yet,  through  all  visitation  and  all  trials. 
Still  they  were  faithful  —  like  two  vessels  launch'd 
From  the  same  beach,  one  ocean  to  explore, 
With  mutual  help,  and  sailing  to  their  league 
True  as  inexorable  winds,  or  bars 
(Floating  or  fix'd)  of  polar  ice,  allow.' 

But  there  is  another  passage  still  more  distinctly  point- 
ing the  reader's  attention  to  the  recurring  cause  of  sepa- 
ration :  — 

*  There  is,  however,  an  obscurity  in  the  expression  at  this  point  of 
the  verses  j  it  lies  partly  in  the  word  such.  The  only  construction 
of  the  verses  in  harmony  with  the  words,  seems  the  following  :  They 
might  have  appeared  as  a  double  tree,  &c.,  whether  viewed  in  those 
circumstances  which  united  them  —  viz.  in  the  features  of  resem- 
blance —  or  viewed  in  those  of  difference,  as  sex  and  its  moral  results, 
which  made  the  partition  between  them.  Such  they  might  have 
geemed;  but  calamity  wrought  a  more  perfect  division  between  them, 
under  which,  they  seemed  no  longer  one,  but  two  distinct  trees. 


RECOLLECTIONS  OF  CHARLES  LAMB.  9* 

•  Ye  were  taught 
That  the  remembrance  of  foregone  distress 
Ard  the  worse  fear  of  future  ill,  (which  oft 
Doth  hang  around  it  as  a  sickly  child 
Upon  its  mother,)  may  be  both  alike 
Disarm'd  of  power  to  unsettle  present  good.' 

This  mysterious  affliction,  therefore,  of  Lamb's  life, 
making  that  a  '  chequered  '  one,  which  else  had  been  of 
a  character  too  absolutely  tranquil  and  monotonous  —  or 
ruffled,  at  least,  only  by  internal  irritations  —  was  (as  we 
learn  from  Wordsworth)  of  a  nature  to  revolve  upon  him 
at  intervals.  One  other  passage  —  and  this  also  from  a 
poem  of  Wordsworth,  but  one  written  at  the  very  least, 
thirty-two  years  ago,  and  having  no  reference  at  all  to  the 
Lambs  —  may  furnish  all  the  additional  light  which  can 
be  needed.  It  is  one  of  the  poems  published  in  1807, 
and  many  of  them  suggested  by  personal  or  local  recol- 
lections, from  a  tour  then  recently  performed  through 
Scotland.  The  poet  is  speaking  of  a  woman  on  the  Bor- 
ders, whose  appearance  and  peculiar  situation,  in  relation 
to  a  disabled  husband,  had  caught  his  attention  ;  and  the 
expression  of  her  eye  is  thus  noticed :  — 

*  I  look'd  and  scann'd  her  o'er  and  o'er  — 
The  more  I  looked,  I  wonder'd  more  ; 
When  suddenly  I  seem'd  to  espy 
A  trouble  in  her  strong  black  eye  — 
A  remnant  of  uneasy  light  — 
A  flash  of  something  over-bright*  — 

Now,  if  the  reader  will  ask  himself  what  cause,  apt  to 
recur,  in  some  cases,  would  be  likely  to  leave  these 
morbid  appearances  in  the  eye,  this  uneasy  light,  and 
these  flashes  that  were  over-bright  —  he  will  then  appre- 
hend, in  silence  and  reverential  sympathy,  what  was  that 
huge  and  steadfast  affliction  that  besieged,  through  life, 
*he  heart  of  Charles  Lamb. 


92 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


If  the  reader  will  further  understand  that  this  aifliction 
was  not,  as  the  heaviest  afflictions  oftentimes  hecome,  a 
mere  remembrance  echoing  from  past  times  —  possibly 
'  a  long  since  cancelled  wo  ;  '  but  that  it  was  a  two-headed 
snake,  looking  behind  and  before,  and  gnawing  at  his 
heart  by  the  double  pangs  of  memory,  and  of  anxiety, 
gloomy  and  fearful,  watching  for  the  future  ;  and  finally, 
that  the  object  of  this  anxiety,  who  might  at  any  moment 
be  torn  from  his  fireside,  to  return,  after  an  interval  of 
mutual  suff'ering,  (not  to  be  measured,  or  even  guessed  at, 
but  in  the  councils  of  God,)  was  that  Madonna-like  lady, 
who,  to  him  renewed  the  case  described  with  such  pathetic 
tenderness  by  the  Homeric  Andromache  —  being,  in  fact, 
his  '  all  the  world  ;  '  fulfilling  at  once  all  offices  of  tender- 
ness and  duty  ;  and  making  up  to  him,  in  her  single  char- 
acter of  sister,  all  that  he  had  lost  of  maternal  kindness  — 
all  that  for  her  sake  he  had  forborne  to  seek  of  affections, 
conjugal  or  filial :  —  weighing  these  accumulated  circum- 
stances of  calamity,  the  feeling  reader  will  be  ready  to 
admit  that  Lamb's  cup  of  earthly  sorrow  was  full  enough, 
to  excuse  many  more  than  he  could  be  taxed  with,  of 
those  half-crazy  eccentricities  in  which  a  constant  load  of 
secret  affliction  (such,  I  mean,  as  must  not  be  explained  to 
the  world)  is  apt  to  discharge  itself.  Hence,  it  might  be, 
in  part  —  but  some  have  supposed  from  a  similar,  though 
weaker  taint  of  the  same  constitutional  malady  —  that 
Lamb  himself  discovered  symptoms  of  irregular  feeling  or 
thinking,  not  such  as  could  have  been  alarming  in  a  gen- 
eral or  neutral  case,  but  in  a  subject  known  to  be  afiected 
by  these  hereditary  predispositions,  were  alarming,  both  to 
his  friends,  (those  of  them,  at  least,  who  had  known  the 
circumstances,)  and,  with  far  heavier  reason,  to  himselL 
This  also  is  therefore  to  be  added  to  his  afflictions  —  not 
merely  the  fear,  constantly  impending  that  his  fireside  (as 


KECOLLECTIONS  OP  CHARLES  LAMB.  93 


I  said  before)  miglit  be  rendered  desolate,  and  that  by  a 
sudden  blow,  as  well  as  for  an  indefinite  duration  ;  but 
also  the  fear  (not  equally  strong,  but  equally  impending 
for  ever)  that  he  himself,  and  all  his  splendid  faculties, 
might,  as  by  a  flash  of  lightning,  be  swallowed  up  '  in 
darkness  infinite.'* 

Such  was  the  condition  of  Charles  Lamb,  and  such  the 
temper  that  in  part  gre  w  out  of  it  —  angelically  benign, 
but  also,  in  a  morbid  degree,  melancholy  —  when  I  re- 
newed my  acquaintance  with  him  in  1808-  14  ;  a  period 
during  which  I  learned  to  appreciate  him  better.  Some- 
where in  this  period  it  Avas,  by  the  way,  that  I  had  an 
opportunity  of  introducing  to  his  knowledge  my  brother, 
'  poor  Pink/  Lamb  liked  him  ;  and  the  more  so,  from 
an  accident  which  occurred  at  the  very  second  interview 
that  he  and  Pink  ever  had.  It  was  in  Bond  street,  at  an 
exhibition  of  two  large  and  splendid  pictures  by  Salvator 
Rosa ;  one  representing  a  forest  scene,  and  a  forest  re- 
cluse, (of  what  character,  in  Salvator's  intention,  may  be 
doubted  ;  but,  in  the  little  printed  account  of  the  paint- 
ings, he  was  described  as  Diogenes.)  These  pictures 
were,  I  should  think,  twelve  feet  high,  at  the  least, 
consequently  upon  a  large  scale,  and  the  tone  of  coloring 
was  peculiarly  sombre,  or  rather  cold ;  and  it  tended 
even  to  the  monotonous ;  one  almost  uniform  cheerless 
tint  of  yellowish  green,  with  some  little  perhaps  of  a 
warmish  umber,  overspread  the  distances  ;  and  the  fore- 
ground showed  little  else  than  a  heavy  dull-toned  black. 
Pink,  who  knew  as  little  of  painting  as  the  lovisons  of 
his  various  ships,  had,  however,  a  profound  sensibility 
to  some  of  its  effects  ;  and,  if  he  ever  ran  up  hastily  and 
fearfully  to  London  from  Portsmouth,  it  was  sure  to  ba 

•  *  The  angel  ended  his  mysterious  rite  ; 

And  the  pure  vision  closed  in  darkness  infinite.* 


i>4  LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 

at  the  time  when  the  annual  exhibition  of  the  Academy 
was  open.  No  exhibition  was  ever  missed  by  him, 
whether  of  a  public  or  comparatively  private  nature 
In  particular,  he  had  attended,  with  infinite  delight^ 
the  exhibition  (in  Newman  Street,  I  think)  of  Mr. 
West's  pictures.  Death  and  his  Pale  Horse  prodigiously 
attracted  him ;  and  others,  from  the  freshness  and  gor- 
geousness  of  their  coloring,  had  absolutely  fascinated  his 
eye.  It  may  be  imagined,  therefore,  with  what  disgust 
he  viewed  two  subjects,  from  which  the  vast  names  of 
the  painter  had  led  him  to  expect  so  much,  but  which 
frdm  the  low  style  of  the  coloring  yielded  him  so  little. 
There  might  be  forty  people  in  the  room  at  the  time 
my  brother  and  I  were  there.  We  had  stood  for  ten 
or  fifteen  minutes,  examining  the  pictures,  when  at 
length  I  noticed  Charles  Lamb,  and,  at  a  little  distance, 
his  sister.  If  a  creditor  had  wished  to  seize  upon  either, 
no  surer  place  in  London  (no,  not  Drury  Lane,  or 
Covent  Garden)  for  finding  them,  than  an  exhibition 
from  the  works  of  the  old  masters.  And,  moreover, 
as  amongst  certain  classes  of  birds,  if  you  have  one  you 
are  sure  of  the  other,  so  with  respect  "to  the  Lambs, 
(unless  in  those  dreary  seasons  when  the  '  dual  unity  '  — 
as  it  is  most  affectingly  termed  by  Wordsworth  —  had 
been  for  a  time  sundered  into  a  widowed  desolation,  by 
the  periodic  affliction,)  seeing  or  hearing  the  brother,  you 
knew  that  the  sister  could  not  be  far  off.  If  she  were, 
you  sighed,  knew  what  that  meant,  and  asked  no  ques- 
tions. 

Lamb,  upon  seeing  us,  advanced  to  shake  hands ;  but 
he  paused  one  moment  to  await  the  critical  dogma  which 
he  perceived  to  be  at  that  time  issuing  from  Pink's  lips. 
That  it  was  vituperation  in  a  high  degree,  anybody  near 
us  might  hear  ;  and  some  actually  turned  round  in  frigh 


KECOLLECTIONS  OF  CHAKLES  LAMB.  95 

upon  catching  these  profane  words :  —  '  D  the  fel- 
low !  I  could  do  better  myself.'  Wherewith,  perhaps 
unconsciously,  but  perhaps  also  by  way  of  enforcing  his 
thought,  Pink  (who  had  brought  home  from  his  long  sea 
life  a  detestable  practice  of  chewing  tobacco)  ejaculated 
a  quid  of  some  coarse  quality,  that  lighted  upon  the  frame 
of  the  great  master's  picture,  and,  for  aught  I  know,  may 
be  sticking  there  yet.  Lamb  could  not  have  approved 
such  a  judgment  —  nor  perhaps  the  immeasurable  pre- 
sumption that  might  seem  to  have  accompanied  such  a 
judgment  from  most  men,  or  from  an  artist ;  but  he  knew 
that  Pink  was  a  mere  sailor,  knowing  nothing  historically 
of  art,  nor  much  of  the  pretensions  of  the  mighty  artists. 
Or,  had  it  been  otherwise  —  at  all  events,  he  admired  and 
loved,  beyond  all  other  qualities  whatsoever,  a  hearty, 
cordial  sincerity :  honest  homely  obstinacy,  not  to  be 
enslaved  by  a  great  name  —  though  that,  again,  may,  by 
possibility,  become  in  process  of  time  itself  an  affectation 
—  Lamb  almost  reverenced  ;  and  therefore  it  need  not 
surprise  anybody,  that,  in  the  midst  of  his  loud,  unre- 
pressed  laughter,  he  came  up  to  my  brother,  and  offered 
his  hand,  with  an  air  of  friendliness  that  flattered  Pink, 
and  a  little  misled  him  :  for,  that  evening,  on  dining  with 
Pink,  he  said  to  me  —  '  That  Lamb 's  a  sensible  fellow. 
You  see  how  evidently  he  approved  of  what  I  remarked 
about  that  old  humbugging  rascal,  Salvator  Rosa.'  Lamb, 
in  this  point,  had  a  feature  of  character  in  common  with 
Sir  Walter  Scott,  (at  least  I  suppose  it  to  have  been  a 
feature  of  Sir  Walter's  mind,  upon  the  information  of 
Professor  Wilson,)  that,  if  a  man  had,  or,  if  he  supposed 
him  to  have,  a  strongly  marked  combination  or  tendency 
of  feelings,  of  opinions,  of  likings,  or  of  dislikings  —  what 
in  fact,  we  call  a  character  —  no  matter  whether  it  were 
Suilt  upon  prejudices  the  most  extravagant,  or  ignorance 


96  LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 

the  most  profound,  provided  only  it  were  sincere,  and 
not  mere  lawless  audacity,  but  were  self-consistent,  and 
had  unity  as  respected  itself —  in  that  extent,  he  was 
sure  to  manifest  liking  and  respect  for  the  man.  And 
hence  it  was,  that  Lamb  liked  Pink  much  more  for  this 
Gothic  and  outrageous  sentence  upon  Salvator  Rosa,  than 
he  would  have  liked  him  for  the  very  best,  profoundest, 
or  most  comprehensive  critique  upon  that  artist  that 
could  have  been  delivered.  Pink,  on  the  other  hand, 
liked  Lamb  greatly  :  and  used,  in  all  his  letters,  to  re- 
quest that  I  would  present  his  best  regards  to  that  Charles 
Lamb,  '  who  wouldn't  be  humbugged  by  the  old  rascal  in 
Bond  Street.' 

Thus  I  had  gradually  unlearned  my  false  opinions,  or 
outworn  my  false  impressions,  about  Lamb,  by  the  year 
181^.  Indeed,  by  that  time,  I  may  say  that  I  had 
learned  to  appreciate  Lamb  almost  at  his  full  value. 
And  reason  there  was  that  I  should.  For,  in  that  year, 
1814,  occuiTcd  a  trial  of  Lamb's  hold  upon  his  friends' 
regard,  which  was  a  test  case  —  a  test  for  each  side  — 
since  not  every  man  could  have  mastered  this  offence ; 
and  far  less  could  every  man  ha^^e  merited  that  a  man 
should  master  it.  This  was  the  year  which  closed  the 
great  war  of  wars,  by  its  first  frail  close  —  the  capture  of 
Paris  by  the  Allies.  And  of  these  Allies,  all  who  had 
any  personal  weight  or  interest  (the  Austrian  Emperor, 
who  was,  however,  expected  at  one  time,  is  no  exception 
—  for  his  weight  was  not  personal  but  political)  —  all, 
I  say,  visited  London  and  Oxford.  I  was  at  London 
during  that  glad  tumultuous  season.  I  witnessed  the 
fervent  joy  —  the  triumph,  too  noble,  too  religious,  to 
be  boastful  —  the  rapture  of  that  great  era.  Coleridge, 
in  the  first  edition  of  the  *  Friend,'  has  described  the 
iempestuous  joy  of  a  people,  habitually  cold  in  relation 


RECOLIECTIONS  OP  CHARLES   LAMB.  91 

to  public  events,  upon  occasion  of  a  visit  from  their 
Sovereign's  wife  —  the  ill-fated  Queen  of  Prussia  ;  and 
this  he  does  by  way  of  illustrating  the  proposition  which 
then  occupies  him  —  viz.  the  natural  tendency  of  men  to 
go  beyond  the  demands  of  any  event,  whether  personal 
or  national,  their  inevitable  tendency  to  transcend  it  by 
fhe  quality  and  the  amount  of  their  enthusiasm.  Now, 
the  scenes  then  acting  in  London  were,  in  two  weighty 
respects,  different.  In  the  first  place,  the  people  —  the 
audience  and  spectators  —  concerned,  were  a  people  as 
widely  opposed  to  the  Prussians  in  sensibility  of  a  pro- 
•^ound  nature  as  it  is  possible  to  imagine ;  the  Prussians 
being  really  phlegmatic  ;  and  the  British  —  as  was  many 
hundreds  of  times  affirmed  and  (as  far  as  the  case  ad- 
mitted of  proof)  proved  by  the  celebrated  Walking 
Stewart,  the  profoundest  of  judges  on  this  point  —  the 
British  being,  under  the  mask  of  a  cold  and  reserved 
demeanor,  the  most  impassioned  of  all  nations  :  in  fact,  it 
requires  but  little  philosophy  to  see,  that,  always,  where 
the  internal  heat  and  power  is  greatest,  there  will  the 
outside  surface  be  the  coldest ;  and  the  mere  prima  facie 
phenomenon  of  heat,  spread  over  the  external  manner,- 
(as  in  the  French  or  Italian  character,  and  somewhat  in 
the  Irish,)  is  at  once  an  evidence  that  there  is  little 
concentration  of  it  at  the  heart.  The  spectators,  then, 
the  audience,  were  different ;  and  the  spectacle  —  oh. 
Heavens  ! —  how  far  it  must  have  difiered  from  any  that 
can  have  been  witnessed  for  many  centuries  !  Victors, 
victories,  mere  martial  talents  —  were  these  the  subjects 
of  interest  ? 

No  man,  not  Lamb  himself,  could  rate  at  a  lower  price 
such  natiorjal  vanities  as  these,  fitted  only,  as  I  think,  to 
win  a  schoolboy's  sympathy.    In  fact,  I  have  always 
entertained  and  avowed  a  theory  upon  the  question  of 
7 


LITEKABY  HEMINISCENCES. 


mere  military  talent,  wliich  goes  far  lower  than  anybody 
has  yet  gone,  so  far  as  I  am  aware  ;  for  I  have  gone  sc 
far  as  to  maintain  this  doctrine  —  that,  if  we  could  de- 
tach from  the  contemplation  of  a  battle  the  awful 
interests  oftentimes  depending  upon  its  issue  —  if,  in 
fact,  we  could  liberate  our  minds  from  the  Hartleian 
law  of  association,  and  insulate  the  mere  talent  there 
operating  —  we  should  hold  the  art  of  fighting  a  battle 
to  be  as  far  below  the  art  of  fighting  a  game  at  chess, 
as  the  skill  applicable  to  the  former  case  is  less  sure  of 
its  effect  and  less  perfect  than  the  skill  applicable  to  the 
latter.  It  is  true  there  are  other  functions  of  a  com- 
mander-in-chief, involving  large  knowledge  of  human 
nature,  great  energy  in  action,  great  decision  of  character, 
supreme  moral  courage,  and,  above  all,  that  rarest  species, 
which  faces,  without  shrinking,  civil  responsibility.  These 
qualities,  in  any  eminent  degree,  are  rare.  But,  confining 
one's  view  to  the  mere  art  of  fighting  a  battle,  I  hold  and 
insist  upon  it,  that  the  military  art  is  (intellectually  speak- 
ing) a  vulgar  art,  a  mechanic  art,  a  very  limitary  art ;  neither 
liberal  in  its  nature,  nor  elevated  (as  some  mechanic  arts* 
are)  by  the  extensive  range  of  its  details.  With  such  opin- 
ions, I  am  not  a  person  to  be  confounded  with  mere  John- 
Bull  exulters  in  national  prowess.  Not  as  victories  won  by 
English  bayonets  or  artillery,  but  as  victories  in  a  sublime 
strife  of  the  good  principle  with  the  bad,  I  entered  with 
all  my  heart  into  the  fulness  of  the  popular  feeling  :  1 
rejoiced  with  the  universal  nation  then  rejoicing.  There 
was  the  '  nation  of  London  '  (as  I  have  before  called  it)  to 
Degin  with  ;  there  was  also  another  nation  almost,  collected 
within  the  walls  of  London  at  that  time.  I  rejoiced,  as  T 
nave  said  :  Lamb  did  not.    Then  I  was  vexed. 


RECOLLECTIONS  OF  CHABTES  LAMB. 


99 


CHAPTER  IV. 

RECOLLECTIONS  OF  CHARLES  LAMB. 

It  was  summer.  The  earth  groaned  under  foliage  and 
flowers  —  fruits  I  was  going  to  say,  but,  as  yet,  fruits 
were  not  —  and  the  heart  of  man  under  the  burthen  of 
triumphant  gratitude  :  man,  I  say ;  for  surely  to  man,  and 
not  to  England  only,  belonged  the  glory  and  the  harvest 
of  that  unequalled  triumph.^'  Triumph,  however,  in  the 
sense  of  military  triumph,  was  lost  and  swallowed  up  in 
the  vast  overthrow  of  evil,  and  of  the  evil  principle.  All 
nations  sympathized  with  England  —  with  England,  as 
the  centre  of  this  great  resurrection ;  centre  for  the  power ; 
centre,  most  of  all,  for  the  moral  principle  at  work.  It 
was,  in  fact,  on  that  ground,  and  because  all  Europe  felt 
and  acknowledged  that  England  had  put  a  soul  into  the 
resistance  to  Napoleon,  wherever  and  in  whatever  corner 

♦  It  is  a  favorite  doctrine  witli  some  of  the  Radical  Reformera 
(thanks  be  to  God  !  not  with  all,)  to  vilify  and  disparage  the  war 
with  France,  from  1793  to  1815,  not  (as  might,  perhaps,  consistently 
be  done,  during  some  of  its  years,)  but  throughout  and  uncon- 
ditionally —  in  its  objects,  its  results,  its  principles.  Even  contem- 
plating the  extreme  case  of  a  conquest  by  France,  some  of  the 
Radicals  maintain,  that  we  should  not  have  suffered  much  ;  that  the 
French  were  a  civilized  people  ;  that,  doubtless,  they  (here,  however, 
it  was  forgotten  that  this  *  they  '  was  not  the  French  people,  but  the 
French  army)  would  not  have  abused  their  power,  even  suppose 
them  to  have  gained  possession  of  London.  Candid  reader  !  read 
Cuppa's  account  of  the  French  reign  in  Rome  ;  any  account  of 
^Hvoust's  in  Hamburgh  ;  any  account  of  Junot's  in  Lisbon. 


100 


lilTEBARY  REMINISCENCES. 


manifested  —  therefore  it  was  that  now  the  crowned  heads 
of  Europe,  'with  all  their  peerage,'  paid  a  visit  to  this 
marvellous  England.  It  was  a  distinct  act  of  homage 
from  all  the  thrones  of  Europe,  now  present  on  our  shores, 
actually,  or  by  representation.  Certain  it  is,  that  these 
royal  visits  to  England  had  no  other  ground  than  the 
astonishment  felt  for  the  moral  grandeur  of  the  country, 
which  only,  amongst  all  countries,  had  yielded  nothing  to 
fear  —  nothing  to  despondency  ;  and  also  the  astonishment 
felt,  at  any  rate,  by  those  incapable  of  higher  emotions, 
for  its  enormous  resources,  which  had  been  found  adequate 
to  the  support,  not  only  of  its  own  colossal  exertions, 
but  of  those  made  by  almost  half  of  Christendom  besides. 
Never  before  in  this  world  was  there  so  large  a  congress 
of  princes  and  illustrious  leaders,  attracted  together  by 
the  mere  force  of  unwilling,  and,  in  some  instances,  jealous 
admiration.  I  was  in  London  during  that  fervent  carnival 
of  national  enthusiasm ;  and  naturally,  though  no  seeker 
of  spectacles,  I  saw  —  for  nobody  who  walked  the  streets 
of  western  London  could  avoid  seeing  —  the  chief  objects 
of  public  interest.  I  was  passing  from  Hyde  Park  along 
Piccadilly,  on  the  day  when  the  Emperor  of  Russia  was 
expected  Many  scores  of  thousands  had  gone  out  of 
London  over  Blackfriars'  Bridge,  expressly  to  meet  him, 
on  the  understanding  that  he  was  to  make  his  approach  by 
that  route.  At  the  moment  when  I  reached  the  steps  of 
he  Pulteney  Hotel,  a  single  carriage  of  plain  appearance, 
.bllowed  by  two  clumsy  Cossack  small  landaus,  (or  rathei 
what  used  to  be  called  sociables,)  approached  at  a  rapid 
pace :  so  rapid,  that  I  had  not  time  to  pass  before  the 
waiters  of  the  hotel  had  formed  a  line  across  the  foot- 
pavement,  intercepting  the  passing.  In  a  moment,  a  cry 
arose  —  '  The  Czar  !  the  Czar  ! '  —  and  before  I  could 
count  six,  I  found  v  ys^lf  in  a  crowd.    The  carriage  door 


BECOLLECTIONS  OF  CHARLES  LAMB. 


101 


was  opened,  the  steps  let  down,  and  one  gentleman,  un- 
attended, stepped  out.  His  purpose  was  to  have  passed 
through  the  avenue  formed  for  him,  in  so  rapid  a  way  as 
to  prevent  any  recognition  of  his  person ;  but  the  cry  in 
the  street,  the  huzzas,  and  the  trampling  crowd,  had 
brought  to  a  front  window  on  the  drawing-room  story  a 
lady  whom  I  had  seen  often  before,  and  knew  to  be  the 
Duchess  of  Oldenburg,  the  Emperor's  sister.  Her  white 
dress  caught  the  traveller's  eye  ;  and  he  stopped  to  kiss 
his  hand  to  her.  This  action  and  attitude  gave  us  all  an 
admirable  opportunity  for  scanning  his  features  and  whole 
personal  appearance.  There  was  nothing  about  it  to  im- 
press one  very  favorably.  His  younger  brother,  the 
present  Emperor,  is  described  by  all  those  who  saw  him, 
when  travelling  in  Great  Britain,  as  a  man  of  dignified 
and  impressive  exterior.  Not  so  with  the  Emperor  Alex- 
ander ;  he  was  tall,  and  seemed  likely  to  become  corpu- 
lent as  he  advanced  in  life,  (at  that  time  he  was  not  above 
thirty-seven ;)  and  in  his  figure  there  seemed  nothing 
particularly  amiss.  His  dress,  however,  was  unfortunate  ; 
it  was  a  green  surtout :  now,  it  may  be  remarked,  that 
men  rarely  assume  this  color  who  have  not  something 
French  in  their  taste.  His  v^as  so  in  all  things,  as  might 
be  expected  from  his  French  education  under  the  literary 
fribble.  Monsieur  La  Harpe. 

But,  waiving  his  appearance  in  other  respects,  what 
instantly  repelled  all  thoughts  of  an  imperial  presence, 
was  his  unfortunate  face.  It  was  a  face  wearing  a  north- 
ern fairness,  and  not  perhaps  unaimable  in  its  expression ; 
but  it  was  overladen  with  flesh,  and  expressed  nothing  at 
all ;  or,  if  anything,  good  humor,  good  nature,  and  con- 
siderable self-complacency.  In  fact,  the  only  prominent 
feature  ii7  the  Czar's  disposition  was,  an  amiable,  some- 
what sentimental  ostentation  —  amiable,  I  say,  for  it  was 


102 


lilTEEARY  REMINISCENCES. 


not  connected  with  a  gloomy  pride  or  repulsive  arrogance, 
but  with  a  blind  and  winning  vanity.  And  this  cast  of 
character  was  so  far  fortunate,  as  it  supplied  impulses  to 
exertion,  and  irritated  into  activity  a  weak  mind,  that 
would  else,  by  its  natural  tendencies,  have  sunk  into 
torpor.  His  extensive  travels,  however,  were  judiciously 
fitted  for  rescuing  him  from  t]\at  curse  of  splendid  courts ; 
and  his  greatest  enemy  had  also  been  his  greatest  bene- 
factor, though  unintentionally,  through  the  tempestuous 
agitations  of  the  Russian  mind,  and  of  Russian  society, 
in  all  its  strata,  during  that  most  portentous  of  all  ro- 
mances —  not  excepting  any  of  the  crusades,  or  the 
adventurous  expeditions  of  Cortez  and  Pizarro,  still  less 
the  Parthian  invasions  of  Crassus  or  of  Julian  —  viz.  the 
anabasis  of  Napoleon.  There  can  be  no  doubt,  tc  any 
reflecting  mind,  that  the  happiest  part  of  his  reign,  even 
to  Charles  I.,  was  that  which  was  also,  in  a  political 
sense,  the  period  of  his  misfortunes  —  viz.  the  seven  years 
between  1G41  and  1649  ;  three  of  which  were  occupied 
in  stormy  but  adventurous  war  ;  and  the  other  four  in 
romantic  journeys,  escapes,  and  attempts  at  escape, 
checkered,  doubtless,  with  trepidations  and  anxieties,  hope 
and  fear,  grief  and  exultation,  which,  however  much 
tainted  with  distress,  still  threw  him  upon  his  own  re- 
sources of  every  kind,  bodily  not  less  than  moral  and 
intellectual,  which  else  the  lethargy  of  a  court  would  have 
left  undeveloped  and  unsuspected  even  by  himself.  Such 
also  had  been  the  quality  of  the  Russian  Emperor's  expe- 
rience for  some  of  his  later  years ;  and  such,  probably, 
had  been  the  result  of  his  own  comparative  happiness. 
Yet  it  was  said,  that,  about  this  time,  the  peace  of  Alex- 
ander's mind  was  beginning  to  give  way.  It  is  well  known 
that  a  Russian  emperor,  lord  of  sixty  million  lives,  is  not 
lord  of  his  own,  not  at  any  time.    He  sleeps  always  in  thf» 


KECOLLECTIONS  OF  CHARLES  LAMB. 


103 


bosom  of  danger,  secret,  unfathomable,  invisible.  It  is  the 
ineyitablo  condition  of  despotism  and  autocracy  that  he 
should  do  so.  And  the  Russian  Czar  is,  as  to  security, 
pretty  nearly  in  the  situation  of  the  Roman  Caesar. 

He,  however,  who  is  always  and  consciously  in  danger, 
may  be  supposed  to  become  partially  reconciled  to  it. 
But,  be  that  as  it  may,  it  was  supposed  that,  at  this  time, 
Alexander  became  aware  of  some  special  conspiracies 
that  were  ripening  at  home  against  his  own  person.  It 
was  rumored  that,  just  about  this  time,  in  the  very  centre 
of  exuberant  jubilations,  ascending  from  every  people  in 
Europe,  he  lost  his  serenity  and  cheerful  temper.  On 
this  one  occasion,  in  the  moment  of  rejoining  a  sister, 
whom  he  was  said  to  love  with  peculiar  tenderness,  he 
certainly  looked  happy ;  but,  on  several  subsequent  oppor- 
tunities that  I  had  of  seeing  him,  he  looked  much  other- 
wise ;  disturbed  and  thoughtful,  and  as  if  seeking  to 
banish  alarming  images,  by  excess  of  turbulent  gayety, 
by  dancing,  or  by  any  mode  of  distraction.  Under  this 
influence  it  was  also,  or  was  supposed  to  be,  that  he  mani- 
lested  unusual  interest  in  religious  speculations ;  diverting 
to  these  subjects,  especially  to  those  of  a  quietist  charac- 
ter, (such  as  the  doctrines  of  the  English  Quakers,)  that 
enthusiasm  which  hitherto,  for  several  years,  he  had  dedi- 
cated to  military  studies  and  pursuits.  Meantime,  the 
most  interesting  feature  belonging  to  the  martial  equipage 
which  he  drew  after  him,  was  the  multitude  of  Tartar  or 
I  ther  Asiatic  objects,  men,  carriages,  &c.,  prevailing  in 
the  crowd,  and  suggesting  the  enormous  magnitude  of  the 
empire  from  whose  remote  piovinces  they  came.  There 
were  also  the  European  Tartars,  the  Cossacks,  with  their 
Hetman  PlatofF.  He  had  his  abode  somewhere  to  the" 
north  of  Oxford  Street ;  and  further  illustrated  the  impe- 
rial grandeur,  being  himself  a  sovereign  prince,  and  yet 


104 


LITERARY  KEMINISCENCES. 


a  vassal  when  he  found  himself  in  the  presence  of  Alex- 
ander. This  prince,  who  (as  is  well  known)  loved  and 
honored  the  English,  as  he  afterwards  testified  by  the 
most  princely  welcome  ^o  all  of  that  nation  who  visited 
his  territories^  was,  on  his  part,  equally  a  favorite  with 
the  English.  He  had  lost  his  gallant  son  in  a  cavalry 
skirmish  ;  and  his  spirits  had  been  much  depressed  by 
that  calamity.  But  he  so  far  commanded  himself  as  to 
make  his  private  feelings  give  way  to  his  public  enthu- 
siasm ;  and  he  never  withdrew  himself  from  the  clamor* 
ous  applause  of  the  mob,  in  which  he  took  an  undisguised 
pleasure.  This  was  the  man,  amongst  all  the  public 
visiters  now  claiming  the  hospitality  of  the  English  Re- 
gent, whom  Lamb  saw  and  talked  of  with  most  pleasure. 
His  sublime  ugliness  was  most  delectable  to  him ;  and 
the  Tartar  propensities,  some  of  which  had  been  perhaps 
exaggerated  by  the  newspapers,  (such  for  instance,  as 
their  drinking  the  oil  out  of  the  street  lamps,)  furnished 
him  with  a  constajit  feu-de-joie  of  jests  and  playful  fictions, 
at  the  expense  of  the  Hetman ;  and  in  that  way  it  was 
that  he  chiefly  expressed  his  sympathy  with  this  great 
festal  display. 

Marshal  Blucher,  who  still  more  powerfully  converged 
upon  himself  the  interest  of  the  public,  was  lodged  in 
a  little  quadrangle  of  St.  James's  Palace,  (that  to  the 
right  of  the  clock- tower  entrance.)  So  imperious  and 
exacting  was  the  general  curiosity  to  see  the  features  of 
the  old  soldier  —  this  Marshal  '  Forwards,'*  as  he  was 
^ilways  called  in  Germany,  and  who  had  exhibited  the 
greater  merit  of  an  Abdiel  fidelity,  on  occasion  of  the 
mighty  day  of  Jena,  —  that  the  court  was  filled  from  an 
early  hour  of  every  morning,  until  a  late  dinner-hour, 
with  a  mob  of  all  ranks,  calling  for  him  by  his  name, 
*out  court,  '  Blucher  !  Blucher  !  *    At  short  intervals,  no 


BEfOLLfiCTIONS  OF  CHAKLES  LAMB.  105 

longer  in  general  than  five  minutes,  the  old  warrior  obeyed 
the  summons  throughout  the  day,  unless  when  he  was 
known  to  be  absent  on  some  public  occasion.  His  sla- 
very must  have  been  most  wearisome  to  his  feelings. 
But  he  submitted  with  the  utmost  good  nature,  and  allowed 
cheerfully  for  the  enthusiasm  which  did  so  much  honor  to 
himself  and  to  his  country.  In  fact,  this  enthusiasm,  on 
his  first  arrival  in  London,  showed  itself  in  a  way  thai 
astonished  everybody,  and  was  half  calculated  to  alarm 
a  stranger.  He  had  directed  the  postilion  to  proceed 
straightway  to  Carlton  House  —  his  purpose  being  to 
present  his  duty  in  person  to  the  Regent,  before  he 
rested  upon  English  ground.  This  was  his  way  of 
expressing  his  homage  to  the  British  nation,  for  uphold- 
ing, through  all  fortunes,  that  sacred  cause  of  which  he 
also  had  never  despaired.  Moreover,  his  hatred  of 
France,  and  the  very  name  French,  was  so  intense, 
that  upon  that  title  also  he  cherished  an  ancient  love 
towards  England.  As  the  carriage  passed  through  the 
gateway  of  the  Horse- Guards,  the  crowd,  which  had 
discovered  him,  became  enormous.  When  the  garden 
or  Park  entrance  to  the  palace  was  thrown  open,  to  admit 
Blucher,  the  vast  mob,  for  the  first  and  the  last  time, 
carried  the  entrance  as  if  by  storm.  All  opposition  from 
•he  porters,  the  police,  the  soldiers  on  duty,  was  vain ; 
ttnd  many  thousands  of  people  accompanied  the  veteran 
prince,  literally  '  hustling '  his  carriage,  and,  in  a  manner 
parrying  him  in  their  arms  to  the  steps  of  the  palace  door ; 
on  the  top  of  which,  waiting  to  receive  him,  stood  the 
English  Eegent.  The  Regent  himself  smiled  graciously 
fXid  approvingly  upon  this  outrage,  which,  on  any  minor 
occasion,  would  have  struck  him  with  consternation,  per- 
haps, as  well  as  disgust. 

Lamb,  I  believe,  as  well  as  myself,  witnessed  part  of 


i06 


LITEKARY  REMINISCENCES. 


this  scene ;  which  was  the  most  emphatic  exhibition  of 
an  uncontrollable  impulse — a  perfect  rapture  of  joy  and 
exultation,  possessing  a  vast  multitude  with  entire  unity 
of  feeling,  that  I  have  ever  witnessed,  excepting,  indeed, 
once  besides,  and  that  was  a  scene  of  the  very  same  kind, 
or  rather  a  reflection  of  the  same  scene.  It  occurred  in 
Hyde  Park,  on  the  following  Sunday :  Prince  Blucher 
and  his  master,  the  King  of  Prussia  ;  the  Hetman  of  the 
Cossacks,  with  his  master,  the  Czar ;  the  Duke  of  Wel- 
lington, with  some  of  the  royal  Dukes,  and  a  vast  cortege 
of  civil  and  military  dignities  —  in  short,  the  elite  of  all 
the  great  names  that  had  grown  into  distinction  in  the 
late  wonderful  campaigns  —  German,  Spanish,  French  — 
rode  into  the  Park,  simultaneously.  If  there  had  been 
any  division  of  their  several  suites  and  parties,  this  had 
vanished  ;  and  all  were  thrown  into  one  splendid  con- 
fusion, under  a  summer  sun.  The  park  was,  of  course, 
floating  with  a  sea  of  human  heads.  And,  in  particular, 
there  was  a  dense  mass  of  horsemen,  amounting  to  six 
thousand  at  least,  (as  I  was  told  by  a  person  accustomed 
to  compute  crowds,)  following  close  in  the  rear.  The 
van  of  this  mighty  body,  composed  of  so  many  '  prince- 
doms, dominations,  virtues,  powers,'  directed  their  course 
to  Kensington  Gardens  —  into  these,  as  privileged  guests, 
Ihey  were  admitted  —  precautions,  founded  on  the  Carlton 
House  experience,  having  been  taken  to  exclude  the 
ignohile  vulgus  who  followed.  The  impulse,  however, 
of  the  occasion,  was  too  mighty  for  the  case.  The  spec- 
tacle was  absolutely  sublime  —  of  hurricane,  instantaneous 
power,  sweeping  away,  like  an  Alpine  lake  broken  loose, 
all  barriers  almost  before  they  were  seen.  The  six  thou* 
sand  horsemen  charged  into  the  gardens ;  that  being  (as 
in  the  other  case)  the  first  and  also  the  last  intrusion  of 
the  kind. 


RECOLLECTIONS  OF  CHARLES  LAMB. 


107 


One  tiling  in  this  popular  festival  of  rejoicing  was 
peculiarly  pleasing  to  myself  and  to  many  others  —  the 
proof  that  was  thus  afforded  to  so  many  eminent  foreign- 
ers of  our  liberality,  and  total  freedom  from  a  narrow  or 
ungenerous  nationality.  This  is  a  grave  theme,  and  one 
which,  on  account  of  the  vast  superstructure  reared  upon 
it,  of  calumnious  insult  to  our  national  character,  requires 
a  separate  discussion.  Here  it  may  be  sufficient  to  say, 
that  Marshal  Blucher,  at  least,  could  have  no  reason  to 
think  us  an  arrogant  people,  or  narrow  in  our  national 
sensibilities  to  merit,  wherever  found.  He  could  not  but 
know  that  we  had  also  great  military  names  to  show  —  one 
or  two  greater  than  his  own ;  for,  in  reality,  his  qualities 
were  those  of  a  mere  fighting  captain,  with  no  great  reach 
of  capacity,  and  of  slender  accomplishments.  Yet  we  — 
that  is  to  say,  even  the  street  mob  of  London  —  glorified 
him  as  much  as  ever  they  did  Lord  Nelson,  and  more 
than  they  ever  did  the  Duke  of  Wellington.  In  this 
crowd,  on  this  memorable  Sunday,  by-the-by,  rode  Prince 
Leopold  of  Saxe  Coburg,  as  yet  obscure  and  poor,  (not 
having  £300  a  year,)  and  seeing  neither  his  future  pros- 
perity, nor  its  sudden  blight,  nor  its  resurrection.  There 
also  rode  the  Prince  of  Orange,  and  many  another,  who 
was  to  reap  laurels  in  the  coming  year,  but  was  yet  dreamr 
ing  not  of  Waterloo  as  a  possibility.  With  respect  to 
Blucher,  however,  it  is  painful  to  know  that  he,  who  was 
now  so  agreeably  convinced  of  our  national  generosity, 
came  afterwards  to  show  that  jealousy  of  us  which  we  had 
so  loudly  refused  to  feel  of  him,  through  the  mere  morti- 
fications practised  on  his  self-esteem,  perhaps  maliciously, 
by  the  French  authorities,  in  passing  by  himself  and 
addressing  their  applications  to  the  Duke  of  Wellington. 

Fouche,  Chaboulon  de  la  Ratre,  and  other  writers, 
Vave  recorded  the  maniacal   rage   of  Prince  Blucher, 


1^8 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


^lien  despatches  from  Paris  passed  througli  his  camp  — 
liay,  were  forwarded  to  his  head- quarters,  in  order  to  gaic 
—  what  ?  Audience  from  him  ?  No.  Sanction  from 
him  ?  No.  Merely  a  countersign,  or  a  passport  for 
the  messenger  ;  some  purely  ministerial  act  of  participa- 
tion in  the  transit  of  the  courier  ;  the  despatches  being 
uniformly  lor  the  Duke  of  Wellington.  This,  on  the 
part  of  the  French  authorities,  must  have  been,  in  some 
respects,  a  malicious  act.  Doubtless,  the  English  general 
was  known  only  in  the  character  of  a  victor  ;  whereas 
Blucher  (and  that  the  old  testy  hussar  should  have 
remembered)  had  never  been  known  at  Paris,  for  any^ 
thing  but  defeats  ;  and,  within  the  w^eek  preceding,  for  a 
signal  defeat,  which  many  think  might  have  been  ripened 
into  a  smashing  overthrow.  But,  still,  there  can  be  no 
doubt  that  deadly  malice  towards  the  Prussian  name  was 
the  true  ground  of  the  act ;  for  the  Parisians  bore  (and 
still  bear)  a  hatred  to  the  Prussians,  absolutely  irrational 
and  inexplicable.  The  battle  of  Rosbach  can  hardly 
have  been  the  reason,  still  less  the  Prussian  resumption 
of  the  trophies  then  gathered  from  France,  and  subse- 
quently carried  off  by  Napoleon  ;  for,  as  yet,  they  had 
not  been  resumed.  The  ground  of  this  hatred  must  have 
lain  in  the  famous  manifesto  of  the  Duke  of  Brunswick  — 
for  he,  as  a  servant  of  the  Prussian  throne,  and  command- 
ing a  Prussian  army,  was  looked  upon  as  a  Prussian, 
This  change,  however,  in  Blucher — this  jealousy  of 
England,  within  so  short  a  time  —  astonished  and  grieved 
%11  who  had  seen  him  amongst  ourselves.  Many  a  time  1 
i-net  him  in  the  street ;  four  or  five  times  in  streets  where 
he  could  not  have  been  looked  for  —  the  streets  of  the 
city  ;  and  always  with  a  retinue  of  applauders,  that 
spread  like  wildfire.  Once  only  he  seemed  to  have  a 
chary^^  ^or  massing  incognito.    It  was  in  Cheapside.  He 


RECOLLECTIONS  OF  CHABLES  LAMB.  109 

ivas  riding,  as  he  generally  was,  in  the  open  carriage  (on 
this  occasion  a  curricle)  of  some  gentleman  with  whom 
he  was  going  to  dine,  at  a  villa  near  London.  A  brewer's 
wagon  stopped  the  way  for  two  minutes ;  in  that  space 
of  time,  twenty  people  crowded  about  who  knew  his 
features  :  '  Elucher  !  Blucher  ! '  resounded  through  the 
street  in  a  moment ;  an  uproar  rose  to  heaven  ;  and  the 
old  Marshal's  face  relaxed  from  its  gravity,  or  its  stern- 
ness, (though,  to  say  the  truth,  there  was  little  of  deter- 
minate expression  in  his  features  ;  and,  if  he  had  not 
been  so  memorable  a  person,  one  would  have  thought 
him  a  mere  snuffy  old  German)  —  relaxing,  however, 
from  his  habitual  tom-cat  gravity,  he  looked  gracious  and 
benign.  Then,  at  least,  he  loved  us  English  ;  then  he 
had  reason  to  love  us  ;  for  we  made  a  pet  of  him  ;  and  a 
pet  in  a  cause  which  would  yet  make  his  bones  stir  in  the 
grave  —  in  the  national  cause  of  Prussia  against  France. 
I  have  often  wondered  that  he  did  not  go  mad  with  the 
fumes  of  gratified  vengeance.  Revenge  is  a  luxury,  to 
those  who  can  rejoice  in  it  at  all,  so  inebriating  that 
possibly  a  man  would  be  equally  liable  to  madness,  from 
the  perfect  gratification  of  his  vindictive  hatred  or  its 
perfect  defeat.  And,  hence,  it  may  have  been  that 
Blucher  did  not  go  mad.  Few  men  have  had  so  ample  a 
vengeance  as  he,  when  holding  Paris  as  a  conqueror ; 
and  yet,  because  he  was  but  one  of  several  who  so  held  it, 
nnd  because  he  was  prevented  from  mining  and  blowing 
up  the  bridge  of  Jena,  in  that  way,  perhaps,  the  delirium 
of  his  vengeance  became  less  intoxicating. 

Now,  returning  to  Lamb,  I  may  remark  that,  at  this 
piem  arable  season,  his  wayward  nature  showed  itself 
more  conspicuously  than  ever.  One  might  have  thought 
that,  if  he  manifested  no  sympathy  in  a  direct  shape  with 
the  primary  cause  of  the  public  emotion,  still  he  would 


110 


LITERARY  REMIXISCENCES. 


have  sympathized,  in  a  secondary  way,  with  the  delirious 
ioy  which  every  street,  every  alley,  then  manifested,  to 
the  ear  as  well  as  to  the  eye.  But  no  !  Still,  like 
Diogenes,  he  threw  upon  us  all  a  scoffing  air,  as  of  one 
who  stands  upon  a  pedestal  of  eternity,  looking  down 
upon  those  who  share  in  the  transitory  feelings  of  their 
own  age.  How  he  felt  in  the  following  year,  when  the 
mighty  drama  was  consummated  by  Waterloo,  I  cannot 
say,  for  I  was  not  then  in  London  :  I  guess,  however, 
that  he  would  have  manifested  pretty  much  the  same 
cynical  contempt  for  us  children  of  the  time,  that  he  did 
in  all  former  cases. 

Not  until  1821,  and  again  in  1823,  did  I  come  to  know 
Charles  Lamb  thoroughly.  Politics,  national  enthusiasm, 
had  then  gone  to  sleep.  I  had  come  up  to  London  in  a 
case  connected  with  my  own  private  interest.  In  the  same 
spirit  of  frankness  that  I  have  shown  on  other  occasions 
in  these  personal  sketches,  I  shall  here  not  scruple  to 
mention,  that  certain  pecuniary  embarrassments  had 
rendered  it  necessary  that  I  should  extricate  myself  by 
literary  toils.  I  was  ill  at  that  time,  and  for  years  after 
—  ill  from  the  effects  of  opium  upon  the  liver  ;  and  one 
primary  indication  of  any  illness  felt  in  that  organ,  is 
peculiar  depression  of  spirits.  Hence  arose  a  singular 
effect  of  reciprocal  action,  in  maintaining  a  state  of  de- 
jection. From  the  original  physical  depression  caused  by 
the  derangement  of  the  liver,  arose  a  sympathetic  de- 
pression of  the  mind,  disposing  me  to  believe  that  I  never 
could  extricate  myself ;  and  from  this  belief  arose,  by 
reaction,  a  thousand-fold  increase  of  the  physical  de- 
pression. I  began  to  view  my  unhappy  London  life  —  a 
life  of  literary  toils,  odious  to  my  heart  —  as  a  permanent 
Btate  of  exile  from  my  Westmoreland  home.  My  three 
eldest  children,  at  that  time  in  the  most  interesting  stages 


RECOLLECTIONS  OF  CHARLES  LAMB.  Ill 

of  childhood  and  infancy,  were  in  Westmoreland  ;  and  so 
powerful  was  my  feeling  (derived  merely  from  a  deranged 
liver)  of  some  long,  never-ending  separation  from  my 
family,  that  at  length,  in  pure  weakness  of  mind,  I  was 
obliged  to  relinquish  my  daily  walks  in  Hyde  Park 
and  Kensington  Gardens,  from  the  misery  of  seeing 
children  in  multitudes,  that  too  forcibly  recalled  my  own. 
The  Picture  of  Fox-ghyll,  my  Westmoreland  abode,  and 
the  solitary  fells  about  it,  upon  which  those  were  roaming 
whom  I  could  not  see,  was  for  ever  before  my  eyes. 
And  it  must  be  remembered  that  distance  —  the  mere 
amount  of  distance  —  has  much  to  do  in  such  a  case. 
You  are  equally  divided  from  those  you  love,  it  is  very 
true,  by  one  hundred  miles.  But  that,  being  a  space 
which  in  England  we  often  traverse  in  eight  or  ten  hours, 
even  without  the  benefit  of  railroads,  has  come  to  seem 
nothing  at  all.  Fox-ghyll,  on  the  other  hand,  was  two 
hundred  and  eighty  miles  distant ;  and  from  the  obstacles 
at  the  latter  end  of  the  journey,  (cross-roads  and  interrup- 
tions of  all  public  communications,)  it  seemed  twice  as 
long. 

Meantime,  it  is  very  true  that  the  labors  I  had  to  face 
would  not,  even  to  myself,  in  a  state  of  good  bodily 
nealth,  have  appeared  alarming.  Myself,  I  say  —  for,  in 
any  state  of  health,  I  do  not  write  with  rapidity.  Under 
the  influence  of  opium,  however,  when  it  reaches  its 
maximum  in  diseasing  the  liver  and  deranging  the  diges- 
tive functions,  all  exertion  whatever  is  revolting  in  excess  ; 
intellectual  exertion,  above  all,  is  connected  habitually, 
when  performed  under  opium  influence,  with  a  sense  of 
disgust  the  most  profound  for  the  subject  (no  matter  what) 
which  detains  the  thoughts  ;  all  that  morning  freshness 
of  animal  spirits,  which,  under  ordinary  circumstances, 
lonsumes,  as  it  were,  and  swallows  up  the  interval  be* 


112 


LITERAKY  REMINISCENCES. 


tween  one's  self  and  one's  distant  object,  (consumes,  that 
is,  in  the  same  sense  as  Virgil  describes  a  high-blooded 
horse  on  the  fret  for  starting,  as  traversing  the  ground 
with  his  eye,  and  devouring  the  distance  in  fancy  before 
it  is  approached)  —  all  that  dewy  freshness  is  exhaled  and 
burnt  off  by  the  parching  effects  of  opium  on  the  animal 
economy.  You  feel  like  one  of  Swift's  Strulbrugs,  pre- 
maturely exhausted  of  life  ;  and  molehills  are  inevitably 
exaggerated  by  the  feelings  into  mountains.  Not  that  it 
was  molehills  exactly  which  I  had  then  to  surmount  — 
they  were  moderate  hills  ;  but  that  made  it  all  the  worse 
in  the  result,  since  my  judgment  could  not  altogether 
refuse  to  go  along  with  my  feelings.  I  was,  besides,  and 
had  been  for  some  time,  engaged  in  the  task  of  unthread- 
ing the  labyrinth  by  which  I  had  reached,  unawares,  my 
present  state  of  slavery  to  opium.  I  was  descending  the 
mighty  ladder,  stretching  to  the  clouds  as  it  seemed,  by 
which  I  had  imperceptibly  attained  my  giddy  altitude  — 
that  point  from  which  it  had  seemed  equally  impossible  to 
go  forward  or  backward.  To  wean  myself  from  opium,  I 
had  resolved  inexorably  ;  and  finally  I  accomplished  my 
vow.  But  the  transition  state  was  the  worst  state  of  all 
to  support.  All  the  pains  of  martyrdom  were  there  :  all 
the  ravages  in  the  economy  of  the  great  central  organ, 
the  stomach,  which  had  been  wrought  by  opium  ;  the  sick- 
ening disgust  which  attended  each  separate  respiration ; 
and  the  rooted  depravation  of  the  appetite  and  the  diges- 
tion—  all  these  must  be  weathered  for  months  upon 
months,  and  without  the  stimulus  (however  false  and 
treacherous)  which,  for  some  part  of  each  day,  the  old 
doses  of  laudanum  would  have  supplied.  These  doses 
were  to  be  continually  diminished  ;  and,  under  this  diffi- 
cult dilemma  —  if,  as  some  people  advised,  the  diminution 
^ere  made  by  so  trifling  a  quantity  as  to  be  imperceptible 


BECOLLECfAOJS'S  0;F  CHABLES  LAMB.  113 

—  in  tliat  case,  the  duration  of  tlie  process  was  intermina- 
ble and  hopeless.  Thirty  years  would  not  have  sufficed 
to  carry  it  through.  On  the  other  hand,  if  twenty-five  to 
fifty  drops  were  withdrawn  on  each  day,  (that  is,  frora 
one  to  two  grains  of  opium,)  inevitably  within  three,  four, 
or  five  days,  the  deduction  began  to  tell  grievously  ;  and 
the  efiect  was,  to  restore  the  craving  for  opium  more 
keenly  than  ever.    There  was  the  collision  of  both  evils 

—  that  from  the  laudanum,  and  that  from  the  want  of 
laudanum.  The  last  was  a  state  of  distress  perpetually 
increasing,  the  other  was  one  which  did  not  sensibly 
diminish  —  no,  not  for  a  long  period  of  months.  Irreg- 
ular motions,  impressed  by  a  potent  agent  upon  the  blood 
or  other  processes  of  life,  are  slow  to  subside ;  they  main- 
tain themselves  long  after  the  exciting  cause  has  been 
partially  or  even  wholly  withdrawn  ;  and,  in  my  case, 
they  did  not  perfectly  subside  into  the  motion  of  tranquil 
health,  for  several  years. 

From  all  this  it  will  be  easy  to  understand  the  fact  — 
though,  after  all,  impossible,  without  a  similar  experience, 
to  understand  the  amount  —  of  my  sufiering  and  despon- 
dency in  the  daily  task  upon  which  circumstances  had 
thrown  me  at  this  period  —  the  task  of  writing  and  pro- 
ducing something  for  the  journals,  invita  Minerva,  Over 
and  above  the  principal  operation  of  my  sufiering  state, 
as  felt  in  the  enormous  difficulty  with  which  it  loaded 
every  act  of  exertion,  there  was  another  secondary  efiect 
which  always  followed  as  a  reaction  from  the  first.  And 
that  this  was  no  accident  or  peculiarity  attached  to  my 
individual  temperament,  I  may  presume  from  the  circum- 
stance, that  Mr.  Coleridge  experienced  the  very  same 
Bensations,  in  the  same  situation,  throughout  his  literary 
life,  and  has  often  noticed  it  to  me  with  surprise  and 
vexation.  The  sensation  was  that  of  powerful  disgust 
8 


114 


LITEKARY  REMINISCENCES. 


with  any  subject  upon  which  he  had  occupied  his 
thoughts,  or  had  exerted  his  powers  of  composition  for 
any  length  of  time,  and  an  equal  disgust  with  the  result 
of  his  exertions  —  powerful  abhorrence  I  may  call  it, 
absolute  loathing,  of  all  that  he  had  produced.  In  Mr. 
Coleridge's  rase,  speaking  at  least  of  the  time  from  1807 
to  1815,  this  effect  was  a  most  unhappy  one  ;  as  it  tended 
to  check  or  even  to  suppress  his  attempts  at  writing  for 
the  press,  in  a  degree  which  cannot  but  have  been  very 
injurious  for  all  of  us  who  wished  to  benefit  by  his  original 
intellect,  then  in  the  very  pomp  of  its  vigor.  This  effect 
was,  indeed,  more  extensive  than  with  myself :  with 
Coleridge,  even  talking  upon  a  subject,  and  throwing  out 
his  thoughts  upon  it  liberally  and  generally,  was  an 
insurmountable  bar  to  writing  upon  it  with  effect.  In  the 
same  proportion  in  which  he  had  been  felicitous  as  a 
talker,  did  he  come  to  loathe  and  recoil  from  the  subject 
ever  afterwards  ;  or,  at  least,  so  long  as  any  impressions 
remained  behind  of  his  own  display.  And  so  far  did  this 
go  —  so  uniformly,  and  so  notoriously  to  those  about  him 
—  that  Miss  Hutchinson,  a  young  lady  in  those  days 
whom  Coleridge  greatly  admired  and  loved  as  a  sister, 
submitted  at  times  to  the  trouble  of  taking  down  what  fell 
from  his  lips,  in  the  hope  that  it  might  serve  as  materials 
to  be  worked  up  at  some  future  period,  when  the  disgust 
should  have  subsided,  or  perhaps  in  spite  of  that  disgust, 
when  he  should  see  the  topics  and  their  illustrations  all 
collected  for  him,  without  the  painful  effort  of  recovering 
them  by  calling  up  loathsome  trains  of  thought.  It  was 
even  suggested,  and  at  one  time  (I  believe)  formally 
proposed,  by  some  of  Coleridge's  friends,  that,  to  save 
from  perishing  the  overflowing  opulence  of  golden 
houghts  continually  welling  up  and  flowing  to  waste  in 
the  course  of  his  ordinary  conversation,  some  short-hand 


RECOLLECTIONS  OF  CHARLES  LAMB  115 


writer,  having  the  suitable  accomplishments  of  a  learned 
education  and  habits  of  study,  should  be  introduced  as  a 
domestic  companion.  But  the  schenve  was  dropped;  per- 
haps from  the  feeling,  in  Coleridge  himself,  that  he  would 
not  command  his  usual  felicity,  or  his  natural  power  of 
thought,  under  the  consciousness  of  an  echo  sitting  by  his 
side,  and  repeating  to  the  world  all  the  half- developed 
thoughts  or  half- expressed  suggestions  which  he  might 
happen  to  throw  out.  In  the  meantime,  for  the  want  of 
some  such  attendant,  certain  it  is,  that  many  valuable 
papers  perished. 

In  1810,  'The  Friend'  was  in  a  course  of  publication 
by  single  sheets  of  sixteen  pages.  These,  by  the  terms 
of  the  prospectus,  should  have  appeared  weekly.  But  if, 
at  any  time,  it  happened  that  Wordsworth,  or  anybody 
else  interested  in  the  theme,  came  into  Coleridge's  study 
whilst  he  was  commencing  his  periodical  lucubrations, 
and,  naturally  enough,  led  him  into  an  oral  disquisition* 
upon  it,  then  perished  all  chance  for  that  week's  fulfilment 
of  the  contract.  Miss  Hutchinson,  who  was  aware  of 
this,  did  her  best  to  throw  hindrances  in  the  way  of  this 
catastrophe,  but  too  often  ineffectually :  and,  accordingly, 
to  this  cause,  as  a  principal  one  amongst  others,  may  be 
ascribed  the  very  irregular  intervals  between  the  several 
numbers  of  '  The  Friend '  in  its  first  edition  ;  and  to  this, 
also,  perhaps,  the  abrupt  termination  of  the  whole  at  the 
twenty-ninth  number.  In  after  years,  Coleridge  assured 
me,  that  he  never  could  read  anything  he  had  written 
without  a  sense  of  overpowering  disgust.  Reverting  to 
my  own  case,  which  was  pretty  nearly  the  same  as  his, 
there  was,  however,  this  difference  —  that,  at  times,  when 
I  had  slept  at  more  regular  hours  for  several  nights  con- 
secutively, and  had  armed  myself  by  a  sudden  increase  of 
the  opium  for  a  few  days  running,  I  recovered,  at  times, 


il6 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


a  remarkable  glow  of  jovial  spirits.  In  some  such  arti- 
ficial respites,  it  was,  from  my  usual  state  of  distress,  and 
purchased  at  a  heavy  price  of  subsequent  suffering,  that 
I  wrote  the  greater  part  of  the  Opium  Confessions  in  the 
autumn  of  1821.  The  introductory  part,  (  i.  e.  the  nar- 
rative part,)  written  for  the  double  purpose  of  creating  an 
interest  in  -what  followed,  and  of  making  it  intelligible, 
since,  without  this  narration,  the  dreams  (which  were  the 
real  object  of  the  whole  work)  would  have  had  no 
meaning,  but  would  have  been  mere  incoherencies  —  this 
narrative  part  was  written  with  singular  rapidity.  The 
rest  might  be  said  to  have  occupied  an  unusual  length  of 
time  ;  since,  though  the  mere  penmanship  might  ha've 
been  performed  within  moderate  limits,  (and  in  fact  under 
some  pressure  from  the  printer,)  the  dreams  had  been 
composed  slowly,  and  by  separate  efforts  of  thought,  at 
wide  intervals  of  time,  according  to  the  accidental  pre- 
valence, at  any  particular  time,  of  the  separate  elements 
of  such  dream  in  my  own  real  dream-experience.  These 
circumstances  I  mention  to  account  for  my  having  written 
anything  in  a  happy  or  genial  state  of  mind,  when  I  was 
in  a  general  state  so  opposite,  by  my  own  description,  to 
everything  like  enjoyment.  That  description,  as  a  general 
one,  states  most  truly  the  unhappy  condition,  and  the 
somewhat  extraordinary  condition  of  feeling,  to  which 
opium  had  brought  me.  I,  like  Mr.  Coleridge,  could  not 
endure  what  I  had  written  for  some  time  after  I  had 
written  it.  I  also  shrunk  from  treating  any  subject  which 
I  had  much  considered  ;  but  more,  I  believe,  as  recoil- 
ing from  the  intricacy  and  the  elaborateness  which  had 
been  made  known  to  me  in  the  course  of  considering  it, 
and  on  account  of  the  difficulty  or  the  toilsomeness, 
which  might  be  fairly  presumed  from  the  mere  fact  that  I 
knd  long  considered  it,  or  could  have  found  it  necessary 


RECOLLECTIONS  OF  CHARLES  LAMB. 


117 


to  do  so,  than  from  any  blind  mechanical  feeling  inevitably 
associated  (as  in  Coleridge  it  was)  with  a  second  survey 
of  the  same  subject. 

One  other  effect  there  was  from  the  opium,  and  I 
believe  it  had  some  place  in  Coleridge's  list  of  morbid 
affections  caused  by  opium,  and  of  disturbances  extended 
even  to  the  intellect  —  which  was,  that  the  judgment  was 
for  a  time  grievously  impaired,  sometimes  even  totally 
abolished,  as  applied  to  anything  which  I  had  recently 
written.  Fresh  from  the  labor  of  composition,  I  believe, 
indeed,  that  almost  every  man,  unless  he  has  had  a  very 
long  and  close  experience  in  the  practice  of  writing,  finds 
himself  a  little  dazzled  and  bewildered  in  computing  the 
effect,  as  it  will  appear  to  neutral  eyes,  of  what  he  has 
produced.  This  result,  from  the  hurry  and  effort  of 
composition,  doubtless  we  all  experience,  or  at  some  time 
have  experienced.  But  the  incapacitation  which  I  speak 
of  here,  as  due  to  opium,  is  of  another  kind  and  another 
degree.  It  is  mere  childless  helplessness,  or  senile 
paralysis,  of  the  judgment,  which  distresses  the  man  in 
attempting  to  grasp  the  upshot  and  the  total  effect  (the 
tout  ensemble)  of  what  he  has  himself  so  recently  pro- 
duced. There  is  the  same  imbecility  in  attempting  to 
hold  things  steadily  together,  and  to  bring  them  under  a 
comprehensive  or  unifying  act  of  the  judging  faculty,  as 
there  is  in  the  efforts  of  a  drunken  man  to  follow  a  chain 
of  reasoning.  Opium  is  said  to  have  some  specific  effect 
of  debilitation  upon  the  memory  ;    that  is,  not  merely  the 

♦  The  technical  memory,  or  that  "v^hich  depends  upon  purely 
arbitrary  links  of  connection,  and  therefore  more  upon  a  nisus  or 
separate  activity  of  the  mind  —  that  memory,  for  instance,  which 
recalls  names — is  undoubtedly  affected,  and  most  powerfully,  by 
opium.  On  the  other  hand,  the  logical  memory,  or  that  which  recalls 
facts  that  are  connected  by  fixed  relations,  and  where  A  being  given, 
B  must  go  before  or  after  —  historical  memory,  for  instance  —  is  not 
P\uch,  if  at  all,  affected  by  opium. 


118 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


general  one  which  might  be  supposed  to  accompany  its 
morbid  effects  upon  the  bodily  system,  but  some  other 
more  direct,  subtle,  and  exclusive ;  and  this,  of  whatever 
nature,  may  possibly  extend  to  the  faculty  of  judging. 

Such,  however,  over  and  above  the  more  known  and 
more  obvious  ill  effects  upon  the  spirits  and  the  health, 
were  some  of  the  stronger  and  more  subtle  effects  of 
opium  in  disturbing  the  intellectual  system,  as  well  as  the 
animal,  the  functions  of  the  will  also  no  less  than  those  of 
the  intellect,  from  which  both  Coleridge  and  myself  were 
suffering  at  the  period  to  which  I  now  refer  (1821-25)  — 
evils  which  found  their  fullest  exemplification  in  the  very 
act  upon  which  circumstances  had  now  thrown  me  as  the 
sine  qua  non  of  my  extrication  from  difficulties — viz.  the 
act  of  literary  composition.  This  necessity,  the  fact  of 
its  being  my  one  sole  resource  for  the  present,  and  the 
established  experience  which  I  now  had  of  the  peculiar 
embarrassments  and  counteracting  forces  which  I  should 
find  in  opium,  but  still  more  in  the  train  of  consequences 
left  behind  by  past  opium  —  strongly  co-operated  with  the 
mere  physical  despondency  arising  out  of  the  liver.  And 
this  state  of  partial  unhappiness,  amongst  other  outward 
indications,  expressed  itself  by  one  mark,  which  some 
people  are  apt  greatly  to  misapprehend,  as  if  it  were  some 
result  of  a  sentimental  turn  of  feeling  —  I  mean  perpetual 
sighs.  But  medical  men  must  very  well  know,  that  a 
certain  state  of  the  liver,  mechanically^  and  without  any 
co-operation  of  the  will,  expresses  itself  in  sighs.  I  was 
much  too  firm-minded,  and  too  reasonable,  to  murmur  or 
complain.  I  certainly  suffered  deeply,  as  one  who  finds 
himself  a  banished  man  from  all  that  he  loves,  and  who 
had  not  the  consolations  of  hope,  but  feared  too  pro- 
foundly that  all  my  efforts  —  efforts  poisoned  so  sadly  by 
opium  —  might  be  unavailing  for  the  end.    But  still  ] 


RECOIiLECTIONS  OF  CHARLES  LAM-B.  1 19 


endured  in  silence.  The  mechanical  sighs,  however, 
revealed,  or  seemed  to  reveal,  what  was  present  in  my 
thoughts.  Lamb  doubtless  remarked  them ;  he  knew  the 
general  outline  of  my  situation ;  and,  after  this,  he  set 
himself,  with  all  the  kindness  of  a  brother.  Miss  Lamb 
with  the  kindness  of  a  sister,  to  relieve  my  gloom  by  the 
closest  attentions.  They  absolutely  persecuted  me  with 
hospitalities ;  and,  as  it  was  by  their  fireside  that  I  felt 
most  cheered,  and  sometimes  elevated  into  hope,  it  may 
be  supposed  that  I  did  not  neglect  to  avail  myself  of  the 
golden  hours  thus  benignantly  interposed  amongst  my 
hours  of  solitude,  despondency,  and  labor  but  partially 
efiectual. 

Thus  then  it  arose,  and  at  this  period,  that  I  had  my 
first  experience  of  Lamb's  nature  and  peculiar  powers. 
During  one  part  of  the  time,  I,  whose  lodgings  were  in 
York  Street,  Covent  Garden,  became  near  neighbor  to 
the  Lambs  —  who  (with  a  view  to  the  two  great  theatres, 
I  believe)  emigrated  for  some  months  from  the  Temple  to 
Russell  Street.  With  their  usual  delicacy,  the  Lambs 
seemed  to  guess  that,  in  my  frame  of  mind,  society  of  a 
mixed  character  might  not  be  acceptable  to  me.  Accord- 
ingly, they  did  not  ask  me  to  their  parties,  imless  where 
they  happened  to  be  small  ones ;  but,  as  often  as  they 
were  free  of  engagements  themselves,  they  would  take 
no  denial  —  come  I  must,  to  dine  with  them  and  stay  as 
iate  as  I  would.  The  very  first  time  on  which  these 
dinner  invitations  began,  a  scene  occurred  with  Charle? 
Lamb,  which  so  nearly  resembled  the  Coleridge  and 
*  Ancient  Mariner '  mystification  of  years  long  past,  that 
perhaps,  with  all  my  knowledge  of  his  character,  I  might 
nave  supposed  him  angry  or  ofi'ended  in  good  earnest, 
^lad  I  not  recurred  to  the  lesson  of  that  early  introductory 
visit  to  the  Temple.    Some  accident,  or  perhaps  it  was 


(20 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


Lamb  himself,  had  introduced  the  subject  of  Hazlitt. 
Aware  of  Lamb's  regard  for  him,  and  of  what  I  esteemed 
his  3xaggerated  estimate  of  Hazlitt's  powers,  I  fought  shy 
of  any  opinion  upon  him.  The  fact  is,  somewhere  about 
that  time  —  but  I  am  not  sure  whether  this  had  yet  hap- 
pened —  Hazlitt  had  published  a  little  book  which  was 
universally  laughed  at,  but  which,  in  one  view  of  it, 
greatly  raised  him  in  my  opinion,  by  showing  him  to  be 
capable  of  stronger  and  more  agitating  passions  than  I 
believed  to  be  within  the  range  of  his  nature.  He  had 
published  his  '  Liber  Amoris,  or  the  Modern  Pygmalion.' 
And  the  circumstances  of  the  case  were  these  :  —  In  a 
lodging-house,  which  was  also,  perhaps,  a  boarding-house, 
in  the  neighborhood  of  Lincoln's  Inn,  Hazlitt  had  rooms. 
The  young  woman  who  waited  on  hirn,  was  a  daughter  of 
the  master  of  the  house.  She  is  described  by  Hazlitt, 
whose  eye  had  been  long  familiar  with  the  beauty  (real  or 
ideal)  of  the  painters,  as  a  woman  of  bewitching  features  ; 
though  one  thing,  which  he  confesses  in  his  book,  or  did 
confess  in  conversation,  made  much  against  it — viz.  that 
she  had  a  look  of  being  somewhat  jaded,  as  if  she  were 
unwell,  or  the  freshness  of  the  animal  sensibilities  gone 
by.  This  girl  must  evidently  have  been  a  mercenary 
person.  Well,  if  she  were  not  an  intriguer  in  the  worst 
sense  —  in  the  sense  of  a  schemer,  she  certainly  was. 
Hazlitt,  however,  for  many  weeks  (months  perhaps)  paid 
her  the  most  delicate  attentions,  attributing  to  her  a 
refinement  and  purity  of  character  to  which  he  afterwards 
believed  that  she  had  no  sort  of  pretensions.  All  this 
time — and  here  was  the  part  of  Hazlitt's  conduct  which 
extorted  some  sympathy  and  honor  from  me  —  he  went 
up  and  down  London,  raving  about  this  girl.  Nothing 

else  would  he  talk  of.    *  Have  you  heard  of  Miss  ?  ' 

A.nd  then,  to  the  most  indifferent  stranger,  he  would 


RECOLLECTIONS  OF   CHARLES  LAMB.  121 

hurry  into  a  rapturous  account  of  her  beauty.  For  this 
he  was  abundantly  laughed  at.  And,  as  he  could  not  fail 
to  know  this  —  (for  the  original  vice  of  his  character,  was 
dark,  sidelong  suspicion,  want  of  noble  confidence  in  the 
nobilities  of  human  nature,  faith  too  infirm  in  what  was 
good  and  great)  —  this  being  so,  I  do  maintain  that  a 
passion,  capable  of  stifling  and  transcending  what  was  so 
prominent  in  his  own  nature,  was,  and  must  have  been 
(however  ,  erroneously  planted)  a  noble  afl*ection,  and 
justifying  that  sympathy  which  I  so  cordially  yielded 
him.  I  must  reverence  a  man,  be  he  what  he  may  other- 
wise, who  shows  himself  capable  of  profound  love. 

On  this  occasion,  in  consequence  of  something  I  said 
very  much  like  what  I  am  now  saying,  Hazlitt  sent  me  a 
copy  of  his  '  Liber  Amoris ;  '  which,  by  the  way,  bore 
upon  the  title-page  an  engraved  copy  of  a  female  figure 
—  by  what  painter  I  forget  at  this  moment,  but  I  think  by 
Titian  —  which,  as  Hazlitt  imagined,  closely  resembled 
the  object  of  his  present  adoration.  The  issue  for  Hazlitt, 
the  unhappy  issue  of  the  tale,  was  as  follows  :  —  The  girl 
was  a  heartless  coquette ;  her  father  was  an  humble 
tradesman,  (a  tailor,  I  think ;)  but  her  sister  had  married 
very  much  above  her  rank  ;  and  she,  who  had  the  same 
or  greater  pretensions  personally,  now  stood  on  so  far 
better  ground  than  her  sister,  as  she  could  plead,  which 
originally  her  sister  could  not,  some  good  connections. 
Partly,  therefore,  she  acted  in  a  spirit  of  manoeuvring  as 
regarded  Hazlitt :  he  might  do  as  a  pis  alter,  but  she 
hoped  to  do  better ;  partly  also  she  acted  on  a  more 
natural  impulse.  It  happened  that,  amongst  the  gentle- 
man lodgers,  was  another,  more  favored  by  nature,  as  to 
person,  than  ever  Hazlitt  had  been ;  and  Hnzlitt  was  now 
somewhat  withered  by  life  and  its  cares.  This  stranger 
was  her  '  fancy-man.'     Hazlitt  suspected  something  of 


122 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


thio  for  a  long  time ;  suspected,  doted,  and  was  again 
persuaded  to  abandon  his  suspicions;  and  yet  he  could 
not  relish  her  long  conversations  with  this  gentleman. 
What  could  they  have  to  say,  unless  their  hearts  furnished 
a  subject?  Probably  the  girl  would  have  confessed  at 
once  a  preference,  which,  perhaps,  she  might  have  no 
good  reason  for  denying,  had  it  not  been  that  Hazlitt's 
lavish  liberality  induced  him  to  overwhelm  her  with 
valuable  presents.  These  she  had  no  mind  to  renounce. 
And  thus  she  went  on,  deceiving  and  beguiling,  and 
betraying  poor  Hazlitt,  now  half-crazy  with  passion,  until 
one  fatal  Sunday.  On  that  day,  (the  time  was  evening, 
in  the  dusk,)  with  no  particular  object,  but  unhappy 
because  he  knew  that  she  was  gone  out,  and  with  some 
thought  that,  in  the  wilderness  of  London,  he  might,  by 
chance,  stumble  upon  her,  Hazlitt  went  out ;  and  not  a 
half  mile  had  he  gone,  when,  all  at  once,  he  fancied  that 
he  saw  her.  A  second  and  nearer  glance  showed  him 
that  he  was  right.  She  it  was,  but  hanging  on  the  arm  of 
the  hated  rival  —  of  him  whom  she  had  a  hundred  times 
sworn  that  she  never  spoke  to  but  upon  the  business  of 
the  house.  Hazlitt  saw,  but  was  not  seen.  In  the  blind- 
ness of  love,  hatred,  and  despair,  he  followed  them 
home ;  kept  close  behind  them ;  was  witness  to  the 
blandishments  freely  interchanged,  and  soon  after  he 
parted  with  her  for  ever.  Even  his  works  of  criticism, 
this  dissembling  girl  had  accepted  or  asked  for  as 
presents,  with  what  affectation  and  hypocrisy  Hazlitt  now 
fully  understood.  In  his  book,  he,  in  a  manner,  '  whistles 
her  down  the  wind ; '  notwithstanding  that,  even  at  that 
time,  'her  jesses'  were  even  yet  'his  heart-strings.' 
There  is,  in  the  last  apostrophe  to  her  — '  Poor  weed  ! '  — » 
something  which,  though  bitter  and  contemptuous,  is  yet 
tender  and  gentle ;  and,  even  from  the  book,  but  much 


RECOLLECTIONS  OF  CHARLES  LA-MB.  123 

{nore  from  the  affair  itself,  as  then  reported  with  all  its 
necessary  circumstances,  something,  which  redeemed  Haz- 
litt  from  the  reproach  (which  till  then  he  bore)  of  being 
open  to  no  grand  or  profound  enthusiasm  —  no  overmas- 
tering passion.    But  now  he  showed  indeed  — 

*  The  nympholepsy  of  some  fond  despair.' 

Perhaps  this  furnished  the  occasion  of  our  falling  upon 
the  subject  of  Hazlitt.  What  was  said  will  better  come  in 
upon  another  occasion — (viz.  that  of  Hazlitt.)  Mean- 
time that  Lamb  only  counterfeited  anger,  appeared  from 
this  —  that,  after  tea,  he  read  me  his  own  fine  verses  on 
'  The  Three  Graces ;  '  and,  that  I  might  not  go  off  with 
the  notion  that  he  read  only  his  own  verses,  afterwards  he 
read,  and  read  beautifully  —  for  of  all  our  poets  Lamb 
only  and  Wordsworth  read  well  —  a  most  beautiful  son- 
net of  Lord  Thurlow,  on  '  Lacken  Water.' 

In  answer  to  what  I  considered  Lamb's  extravagant 
estimate  of  Hazlitt,  I  had  said,  that  the  misanthropy 
which  gives  so  unpleasant  a  tone  to  that  writer's  works, 
was,  of  itself,  sufficient  to  disgust  a  reader  whose  feelings 
do  not  happen  to  flow  in  that  channel ;  that  it  was,  more- 
over, a  crude  misanthropy,  not  resting  upon  any  consistent 
basis,  representing  no  great  principles,  good  or  bad,  but 
simply  the  peevishness  of  a  disappointed  man.  I  ad- 
mitted that  such  a  passion  as  a  noble  misanthropy  was 
possible  ;  but  that  there  was  an  ignoble  misanthropy  ;  or, 
(taking  an  illustration,  which  I  knew  would  tell  with 
Lamb  better  than  all  arguments,)  on  the  one  hand,  there 
was  the  lofty,  nay  sublime,  misanthropy  of  Timon  ;  on 
the  other,  the  low  villanous  misanthropy  of  Apemantus. 
Now,  the  cynicism  of  Hazlitt,  as  also  of  another  writer, 
who,  in  our  times,  affected  misanthropy,  if  not  exactly 
hat  of  Apemantus,  was  too  much  akin  to  it ;  not  built  on 


124 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


the  wild  indignation  of  a  generous  nature,  outraged  in  ita 
best  feelings,  but  in  the  envy  of  a  discontented  one. 
Lamb  paused  a  little ;  but  at  length  said,  that  it  was  for 
the  intellectual  HarJitt,  not  the  moral  Hazlitt,  that  he 
professed  so  much  admiration.  Now,  as  all  people  must 
admit  the  splendid  originality  of  much  that  Hazlitt  has 
done,  here  there  might  have  been  a  ready  means,  by  favor 
of  the  latitude  allowed  to  general  expressions,  for  one,  like 
me,  who  disliked  disputing,  to  effect  a  compromise  with 
my  opponent.  But,  unfortunately,  Lamb  chose  to  insinu- 
ate (whether  sincerely  and  deliberately  I  cannot  say)  that 
Hazlitt  was  another  Coleridge  ;  and  that,  allov/ing  for  his 
want  of  poetic  power,  he  was  non  tarn  impar  quam 
dispar.  This  I  could  not  stand.  I,  whose  studies  had 
been  chiefly  in  the  field  of  philosophy,  could  judge  of 
that,  if  I  could  judge  of  anything  ;  and  certainly  I  felt 
entitled  to  say  that  anything  which  Hazlitt  might  have 
attempted  in  philosophy  —  as  his  '  Essay  on  the  Princi- 
ples of  Human  Action,'  and  his  polemic  '  Essay  against 
the  Hartleian  theory  '  —  supposing  even  that  these  were 
not  derived  entirely  from  Coleridge  (as  C.  used  to  assert) 
—  could,  at  the  best,  be  received  only  as  evidences  of 
ingenuity  and  a  natural  turn  for  philosophizing  ;  but,  for 
any  systematic  education  or  regular  course  of  reading  in 
philosophy,  these  little  works  are  satisfactory  proofs  that 
Hazlitt  had  them  not.  The  very  language  and  termi- 
nology which  belong  to  philosophy,  and  are  indispensable 
to  its  free  motion,  do  not  seem  to  have  been  known  to 
aim  And,  whatever  gleams  of  wandering  truth  might 
flash  at  times  upon  his  mind,  he  was  at  the  mercy  oi 
every  random  impulse ;  had  no  principles  upon  any 
subject ;  was  eminently  one-sided  ;  and  viewed  all  things 
under  the  angle  which  chance  circumstances  presented, 
never  from  a  central  station.    Something  of  this  I  said 


flECOLLECTIONS  OF  CHAKLES  LJLMB.  125 

not  wishing  or  hoping  to  disturb  Lamb's  opinion,  but 
piqued  a  little  by  what  seemed  to  me  not  so  much  honor 
done  to  Hazlitt  as  wrong  done  to  Coleridge.  Lamb  felt, 
or  counterfeited  a  warmth,  that  for  the  moment  looked 
like  anger.  *  I  know  not,'  he  said,  '  where  you  have 
been  so  lucky  as  to  find  finer  thinkers  than  Hazlitt ;  for 
my  part,  I  know  of  none  such.  You  live,  I  think,  or 
have  lived,  in  Grasmere.  Well,  I  was  once  there.  I  was 
at  Keswick,  and  all  over  that  wild  country  ;  yet  none 
such  could  I  find  there.  But,  stay,  there  are  the  caves  in 
your  neighborhood,  as  well  as  the  lakes ;  these  we  did  not 
visit.  No,  Mary,'  turning  to  his  sister,  '  you  know  we 
didn't  visit  the  caves.  So,  perhaps,  these  great  men  live 
there.  Oh !  yes,  doubtless,  they  live  in  the  caves  of 
Westmoreland.  But  you  must  allow  for  us  poor  Lon- 
doners. Hazlitt  serves  for  our  purposes.  And  in  this 
poor,  little,  inconsiderable  place  of  London,  he  is  one  of 
our  very  prime  thinkers.  But  certainly  I  ought  to  have 
made  an  exception  in  behalf  of  the  philosophers  in  the 
caves.'  And  thus  he  ran  on,  until  it  was  difficult  to 
know  whether  to  understand  him  in  jest  or  earnest. 
However,  if  he  felt  any  vexation,  it  was  gone  in  a 
moment;  and  he  showed  his  perfect  freedom  from  any 
relic  of  irritation,  by  reading  to  me  one  or  two  of  his 
own  beautiful  compositions  —  particularly  '  The  Three 
Graves.'  Lamb  read  remarkably  well.  There  was  rather 
%  defect  of  vigor  in  his  style  of  reading  ;  and  it  was  a 
Etyle  better  suited  to  passages  of  tranquil  or  solemn 
movement,  than  to  those  of  tumultuous  passion.  But  his 
management  of  the  pauses  was  judicious,  his  enunciation 
»ery  distinct,  his  tones  melodious  and  deep,  and  his 
cadences  well  executed.  The  book  from  which  he  read, 
was  a  folio  manuscript,  in  which  he  had  gathered  together 
%  number  of  gems,  either  his  own,  or  picked  up  at 


126 


LITERARY  REMINISCEN-CES. 


random  from  any  quarter,  no  matter  how  little  in  the 
sunshine  of  the  world,  that  happened  to  strike  his  fancy. 
A.mongst  them  was  one  which  he  delighted  to  read  to  his 
frien(ls,  as  well  on  account  of  its  real  beauty,  as  because 
it  came  from  one  who  had  been  unworthily  treated  and  so 
far  resembled  himself.  It  was  a  sonnet  of  Lord  Thurlow, 
£jr  young  poet  of  those  days,  who  has,  I  believe,  been  long 
dead.  I  know  not  whether  there  is  anything  besides  of 
equal  value  amongst  this  noble  writer's  works ;  but  assur- 
edly the  man  who  could  have  written  this  one  sonnet,  was 
no  fair  subject  for  the  laughter  which  saluted  him  on  his 
public  appearance  as  an  author.  It  was  a  sonnet  on 
seeing  some  birds  in  a  peculiar  attitude  by  the  side  of 
Lacken  Water.  And  the  sentiment  expressed  was  thank- 
fulness to  nature  for  her  bounty  in  scattering  instruction 
everywhere,  and  food  for  meditation,  far  transcending  in 
value,  as  well  as  in  extent,  all  the  teaching  of  the  schools. 
But  the  point  of  the  whole,  which  peculiarly  won  Lamb's 
approbation,  was  the  way  in  which  the  poet  had  contrived 
to  praise  the  one  fountain  of  knowledge  without  disparag- 
ing the  other.  Accordingly,  Lamb  used  always  to  solicit 
the  hearer's  attention,  by  reading  it  twice  over,  to  that 
passage  — 

*  There  need  not  schools,  nor  the  Professor's  chair. 
Though  these  be  good,  to  '  

This  sudden  turning  aside  to  disclaim  any  blame  of  the 
one  power,  because  he  was  proclaiming  the  all-sufficiency 
of  the  other,  delighted  Lamb,  as  a  peculiarly  graceful 
way  of  expressing  the  catholic  charity  which  becomes  a 
^ftoet.  For  it  is  a  maxim  to  which  Lamb  often  gave 
utterance,  (see,  for  instance,  his  letters  to  Bernard 
Barton,)  that  the  genial  effect  of  praise  or  admiration  is 
robbed  of  its  music,  and  untuned,  by  founding  it  upon 
some  blame  or  harsh  disparagement  of  a  kindred  object. 


KECOLLECTIONS  OF  CHARLES  LAMB.  127 

If  blame  be  right  and  called  for,  then  utter  it  boldly  ;  but 
do  not  poison  the  gracious  charities  of  intellectual  love 
Rnd  reverence,  when  settling  upon  grand  objects,  nor 
sully  the  brightness  of  those  objects,  by  forcing  the  mind 
into  a  remembrance  of  something  that  cannot  be  com- 
prehended within  the  same  genial  feelings.  No  maxim 
could  better  display  the  delicacy  and  purity  of  Lamb's 
childlike  spirit  of  love,  to  which  it  was  a  disturbance  and 
a  torture  even  to  be  reminded  that  there  was  anything 
existing  that  was  legitimately  a  subject  for  a  frown  or  a 
Bcowl. 

About  this  time  it  was  —  the  time,  viz.  from  1821  to 
1825  —  that  Lamb  first,  to  my  knowledge,  fell  into  the 
habit  of  sleeping  for  half  an  hour  or  so  after  dinner. 
These  occasions  exhibited  his  countenance  in  its  happiest 
aspect ;  his  slumbers  were  as  tranquil  as  those  of  the 
healthiest  infant ;  and  the  serene  benignity  of  his  features 
became,  in  those  moments,  as  I  have  heard  many  persons 
remark,  absolutely  angelic.  That  was  the  situation  for  an 
artist  to  have  chosen,  in  order  to  convey  an  adequate 
impression  of  his  countenance.  The  portrait  of  him, 
prefixed  to  Sergeant  Talfourd's  book,  is  far  from  being  a 
good  likeness  ;  it  has  the  air  of  a  Venetian  senator,  and 
far  more  resembles  Mr.  Hamilton  Reynolds,  the  distin- 
guished wit,  dressed  for  an  evening  party,  than  Charles 
Lamb.  The  whole-length  sketch  is  better  ;  but  the  nose 
appears  to  me  much  exaggerated  in  its  curve. 

With  respect  to  Lamb's  personal  habits,  much  has  been 
said  of  his  intemperance  ;  and  his  biographer  justly  re- 
marks, that  a  false  impression  prevails  upon  this  subject. 
In  eating,  he  was  peculiarly  temperate  ;  and,  with  respect 
to  drinking,  though  his  own  admirable  wit,  (as  in  that 
delightful  letter  to  Mr.  Carey,  where  he  describes  himself, 
Hrhen  confided  to  the  care  of  some  youthful  protector,  as 


128 


LITERART  KEMINISCENCES. 


an  old  reprobate  Telemachus  consigned  to  the  guidance 
of  a  wise  young  Mentor')  —  though,  I  say,  his  own 
admirable  wit  has  held  up  too  bright  a  torch  to  the 
illumination  of  his  own  infirmities,  so  that  no  efforts  of 
pious  friendship  could  now  avail  to  disguise  the  truth,  yet 
it  must  not  be  forgotten  —  1st,  That  we  are  not  to  imagine 
Lamb's  frailty  in  this  respect  habitual  or  deliberate  —  he 
made  many  powerful  resistances  to  temptation  ;  2dly,  he 
often  succeeded  for  long  seasons  in  practising  entire 
abstinence ;  3dly,  when  he  did  yield  to  the  mingled 
temptation  of  wine,  social  pleasure,  and  the  expansion  of 
his  own  brotherly  heart,  that  prompted  him  to  entire  sym- 
pathy with  those  around  him,  (and  it  cannot  be  denied 
that,  for  any  one  man  to  preserve  an  absolute  sobriety 
amongst  a  jovial  company,  wears  too  much  the  churlish 
air  of  playing  the  spy  upon  the  privileged  extravagances 
of  festive  mirth)  —  whenever  this  did  happen,  Lamb, 
never,  to  my  knowledge,  passed  the  bounds  of  an  agree- 
ble  elevation.  He  was  joyous,  radiant  with  wit  and 
frolic,  mounting  with  the  sudden  motion  of  a  rocket  into 
the  highest  heaven  of  outrageous  fun  and  absurdity  ;  then 
bursting  into  a  fiery  shower  of  puns,  chasing  syllables 
with  the  agility  of  a  squirrel  bounding  amongst  the  trees, 
or  a  cat  pursuing  its  own  tail;  but,  in  the  midst  of  all  this 
stormy  gayety,  he  never  said  or  did  anything  that  could 
by  possibility  wound  or  annoy.  The  most  noticeable 
(eature  in  his  intoxication,  was  the  suddenness  with  which 
.t  ascended  to  its  meridian.  Half  a  dozen  glasses  of  wine 
taken  during  dinner  —  for  everybody  was  encouraged,  by 
his  sunshiny  kindness,  to  ask  him  to  take  wine  —  these, 
with  perhaps  one  or  two  after  dinner,  sufficed  to  complete 
his  inebriation  to  the  crisis  of  sleep ;  after  awaking  from 
which,  so  far  as  I  know,  he  seldom  recommenced  drink- 
ing.   This  sudden  consummation  of  the  effects  was  not, 


RECOLLECTIONS   OF  CHARLES  LAMB. 


129 


perhaps,  owing  to  a  weaker,  (as  Sergeant  Talfourd  sup- 
poses,)  but  rather  to  a  more  delicate  and  irritable  system, 
than  is  generally  found  amongst  men.  The  sensibility  of 
his  organization  was  so  exquisite,  that  effects  which  travel 
by  separate  stages  with  most  other  men,  in  him  fled  along 
the  nerves  with  the  velocity  of  light.  He  had  great  merit 
in  his  frequent  trials  of  abstinence  ;  for  the  day  lost  its 
most  golden  zest,  when  he  had  not  the  genial  evening  on 
which  to  fasten  his  anticipations.  True,  his  mornings 
were  physically  more  comfortable  upon  this  system  ;  but 
then,  unfortunately,  that  mode  of  pleasure  was  all  reaped 
and  exhausted  in  the  act  of  enjoymentj  whilst  the  greater 
pleasure  of  anticipation,  that  (as  he  complained  himself) 
was  wanting  unavoidably,  because  the  morning  unhappily 
comes  at  the  wrong  end  of  the  day  ;  so  that  you  may 
indeed  look  back  to  it  as  something  which  you  have  lost, 
through  the  other  hours  of  the  day ;  but  you  can  never 
look  forward  to  it  as  something  which  is  coming. 

It  is  for  ever  to  be  regretted  that  so  many  of  Lamb'<i 
jests,  repartees,  and  pointed  sayings,  should  have  perished 
irrecoverably ;  and  from  their  fugitive  brilliancy,  which, 
(as  Sergeant  Talfourd  remarks,)  often  dazzled  too  much  to 
allow  of  the  memory  coolly  retracing  them  some  hours 
afterwards ;  it  is  also  to  be  regretted  that  many  have  been 
improperly  reported.  One,  for  instance,  which  had  been 
but  half  told  to  his  biographer,  was  more  circumstantially 
and  more  efiectually  related  thus,  in  my  hearing,  at 
Professor  Wilson's,  by  Dr.  Bo  wring,  soon  after  the  occa- 
sion. It  occurred  at  Mr.  Coleridge's  weekly  party  at 
Highgate.  Somebody  had  happened  to  mention  that 
letter  of  Dr.  Pococke,  upon  the  Arabic  translation  of 
Grotius  de  Veritate  Fidei  Christ.,  in  which  he  exposes  the 
want  of  authority  for  the  trite  legend  of  Mahomet's 
pigeon,  and  justly  insists  upon  the  necessity  of  expunging 
9 


130 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


a  fable  so  certain  to  disgust  learned  Mussulmans,  before 
tlie  books  were  circulated  in  the  East.  This  occasioned 
a  conversation  generally,  upon  the  Mahometan  creed, 
theology,  and  morals  ;  in  the  course  of  A^hich,  some  young 
man,  introduced  by  Edward  Irving,  had  thought  fit  to 
pronounce  a  splendid  declamatory  eulogium  upon  Mahomet 
and  all  his  doctrines.  This,  as  a  pleasant  extravagance, 
had  amused  all  present.  Some  hours  after,  when  the 
party  came  to  separate,  this  philo-Mahometan  missed  his 
hat,  upon  which,  whilst  a  general  search  for  it  was  going 
on,  I<amb,  turning  to  the  stranger,  said  —  '  Hat,  sir  !  — 
your  hat !  Don't  you  think  you  came  in  a  turban  ? '  The 
fact  that  the  hat  was  missing,  which  could  not  have  been 
anticipated  by  Lamb,  shows  his  readiness,  and  so  far  im- 
proves the  Sergeant's  version  of  the  story. 

Finally,  without  attempting,  in  this  place,  any  elaborate 
analysis  of  Lamb's  merits,  (which  would  be  no  easy  task,) 
one  word  or  two  may  be  said  generally,  about  the  position 
he  is  entitled  to  hold  in  our  literature,  and,  comparatively, 
in  European  literature.  His  biographer  thinks  that  Lamb 
had  more  points  of  resemblance  to  Professor  Wilson,  than 
to  any  other  eminent  person  of  the  day.  It  would  be 
presumptuous  to  dismiss  too  hastily  any  opinion  put  for- 
ward by  the  author  of  '  Ion ;  '  otherwise,  I  confess,  that, 
/or  my  own  part,  knowing  both  parties  most  intimately,  I 
eannot  perceive  much  closer  resemblance  than  what  must 
always  be  found  between  two  men  of  genius  ;  whilst  the 
differences  seem  to  me  radical.  To  notice  only  two 
points.  Professor  Wilson's  mind  is,  in  its  movement  and 
style  of  feeling,  eminently  diffusive  —  Lamb's  discontin- 
uous and  abrupt.  Professor  Wilson's  humor  is  broad, 
everwhelming,  riotously  opulent  —  Lamb's  is  minute,  deli- 
cate, and  scintillating.  In  one  feature,  though  otherwise 
as  different  as  possible.  Lamb  resembles  Sir  Walter  Scott 


KECOLLECTIONS  OF  CHARLES  LAMB.  131 


—  viz.  in  the  dramatic  character  of  his  mind  and  taste. 
Both  of  them  recoiled  from  the  high  ideality  of  such  a 
mind  as  Milton's ;  both  loved  the  mixed  standards  of  the 
world  as  it  is  —  the  dramatic  standards  in  which  good  and 
evil  are  intermingled ;  in  short,  that  class  of  composition 
in  whi:;h  a  human  character  is  predominant.  Hence,  also, 
in  the  great  national  movements,  and  the  revolutionary 
struggles,  which,  in  our  times,  have  gone  on  in  so  many 
interesting  parts  of  the  world,  neither  Sir  Walter  Scott 
nor  Lamb  much  sympathized,  nor  much  affected  to 
sympathize,  with  the  aspirations  after  some  exaltation 
for  human  nature  by  means  of  liberty,  or  the  purification 
of  legal  codes  or  of  religious  creeds.  They  were  content 
with  things  as  they  are;  and,  in  the  dramatic  interest 
attached  to  these  old  realities,  they  found  sufficient 
gratification  for  all  their  sensibilities.  In  one  thing,  upon 
consideration,  there  does  strike  me,  some  resemblance 
between  Lamb  and  Professor  Wilson  —  viz.  in  the  ab- 
sence of  affectation,  and  the  courageous  sincerity  which 
belong  to  both ;  and  also,  perhaps,  as  Serjeant  Talfourd 
has  remarked,  in  the  comprehensiveness  of  their  liberality 
towards  all,  however  opposed  to  themselves,  who  have  any 
intellectual  distinctions  to  recommend  them. 

But,  recurring  to  the  question  I  have  suggested  of 
Lamb's  general  place  in  literature,  I  shall  content  myself 
with  indicating  my  own  views  of  that  point,  without,  how- 
ever, pausing  to  defend  them.  In  the  literature  of  every 
nation,  we  are  naturally  disposed  to  place  in  the  highest 
rank  those  who  have  produced  some  great  and  colossal 
work  —  a  '  Paradise  Lost,'  a  '  Hamlet,'  a  '  Novum  Or- 
ganum '  —  which  presupposes  an  effort  of  intellect,  a 
comprehensive  grasp,  and  a  sustaining  power,  for  ita 
original  conception,  corresponding  in  grandeur  to  th^it 


I'SU  LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 

effort,  different  in  kind,  whicli  must  preside  in  its  execu- 
tion. But,  after  this  highest  class,  in  which  th3  power 
to  conceive  and  the  power  to  execute  are  upon  the  same 
scale  of  grandeur,  there  comes  a  second,  in  which  bril- 
liant powers  of  execution,  applied  to  conceptions  of  a  very 
inferior  range,  arc  allowed  to  establish  a  classical  rank. 
Every  literature  pDSsesses,  besides  its  great  national  gal- 
lery, a  cabinet  of  minor  pieces,  not  less  perfect  in  their 
polish,  possibly  more  so.  In  reality,  the  characteristic  of 
this  class  is  elaborate  perfection  —  the  point  of  inferiority 
is  not  in  the  finishing,  but  in  the  compass  and  power  of 
the  original  creation,  which  (however  exquisite  in  its 
class)  moves  within  a  smaller  sphere.  To  this  class 
belong,  for  example,  '  The  Rape  of  the  Lock,'  that  fin- 
ished jewel  of  English  literature;  'The  Dunciad,'  (a  still 
more  exquisite  gem ;)  '  The  Vicar  of  Wakefield,'  (in  its 
earlier  part ;)  in  German,  the  '  Luise  '  of  Voss  ;  in  French 
—  what  ?  Omitting  some  others  that  might  be  named, 
above  all  others,  the  Fables  of  La  Fontaine.  He  is 
the  pet  and  darling,  as  it  were,  of  the  French  literature. 
Now,  I  affirm  that  Charles  Lamb  occupies  a  correspond- 
ing station  to  his  own  literature.  I  am  not  speaking  (it 
will  be  observed)  of  kinds,  but  of  degrees  in  literary 
merit ;  and  Lamb  I  hold  to  be,  as  with  respect  to  English 
literature,  that  which  La  Fontaine  is  with  respect  to 
French.  For,  though  there  may  be  little  resemblance 
otherwise,  in  this,  they  agree,  that  both  were  wayward  and 
eccentric  humorists;  both  confined  their  efforts  to  short 
flights ;  and  both,  according  to  the  standards  of  their 
several  countries,  were,  occasionally,  and,  in  a  lower  key, 
poets.  The  brutal  '  Tales  '  of  La  Fontaine  do  not  merit 
to  be  considered  in  such  an  estimate ;  for  they  are  simply 
vulgar  and  obscene  jokes  thrown  into  a  metrical  version ; 


RECOLLECTIONS  OF  CHARLES  LAMB.  133 


ind  are  never  treated,  as  indoed  they  rarely  could  be 
treated,  poetically.  The  '  Fables  '  are  a  work  of  more 
pretension;  and  throughout  the  works  of  La  Fontaine 
there  is  an  occasional  felicity  in  the  use  of  conversational 
phrases  and  conversational  forms.  But  if  any  reader 
would  wish  to  see  the  difference  between  an  inspired  writer 
and  a  n\erely  naif  writer  of  unusual  cleverness  —  if  he 
would  wish  to  see  the  magical  effects  that  may  be  produced 
upon  the  simplest  incidents  by  a  truly  poetic  treatment  — 
I  would  recommend  to  his  notice  the  fable  of  the  oak  and 
the  broom,  as  told  by  Wordsworth,  with  one  on  the  same 
subject  by  La  Fontaine.  In  the  one  fable,  such  a  soul  is 
introduced  beneath  the  ribs  of  what  else  are  lifeless  sym- 
bols, that,  instead  of  a  somewhat  comic  effect,  the  reader 
is  not  surprised  to  find  a  pensive  morality  breathing  from 
the  whole,  and  a  genuine  pathos  attained,  though  couched 
in  symbolic  images.  But  in  La  Fontaine  we  find,  as 
usual,  levity  in  the  treatment,  levity  in  the  result,  and 
his  highest  attainment  lying  in  the  naivete  or  picturesque 
raciness  of  his  expressions. 

Wordsworth,  however,  it  will  be  said,  is  liot  Lamb.  No  ; 
but  Lamb,  although  upon  a  lower  scale,  has  something  of 
the  same  difference  in  point  of  feeling  ;  and  his  impulses, 
like  those  of  Wordsworth,  are  derived  from  the  depths  of 

*  By  the  way,  it  has  been  made  a  matter  of  some  wonder  in  the 
annals  of  literature,  why  La  Fontaine  was  amongst  the  very  few 
eminent  writers  of  that  age  who  did  not  bask  in  the  court  sunshine; 
and  La  Harpe,  with  many  others,  fancies  that  his  *  Tales  '  excluded 
him.  Bat  there  is  no  wonder  to  those  who  are  acquainted  with  his 
•Fables.*  The  ludicrous  picture  which  he  constantly  presents  of 
courts,  and  courtiers,  and  royalty  —  in  treating  many  of  those 
fables  which  relate  to  the  lion,  &c.  —  must  have  confounded  and 
mortified  the  pompous  scenicax  Louis  XIV.  more  than  the  most  auda* 
lious  acts  of  rebellion;  and  could  not  have  been  compensated  by  tht 
nollow  formality  of  a  few  stilted  dedicatory  addresses. 


134 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


nature,  not  from  the  surfaces  of  manners.  We  need  not, 
indeed,  wonder  at  the  profounder  feeling,  and  the  more 
intense,  as  well  as  consistent  originality  of  Lamb,  when 
we  contrast  his  character,  disposition^  life,  and  general 
demeanor,  as  I  have  here  endeavored  to  sketch  them,  with 
what  we  know  of  La  Fontaine,  viewed  under  the  same 
aspects.  Not  only  was  La  Fontaine  a  vicious  and  heart- 
less man,  but  it  may  be  said  of  him,  with  perfect  truth, 
that  his  whole  life  was  a  lie,  and  a  piece  of  hollow  mas- 
querading. By  some  accident,  he  had  gained  the  charac- 
ter of  an  absent  man  ;  and,  for  the  sake  of  sustaining  this 
distinction,  with  the  poor  result  of  making  sport  for  his 
circle,  he  committed  extravagances  which  argue  equal 
defect  of  good  sense  and  sincere  feeling  in  him  who  was 
the  actor,  and  in  those  who  accredited  them.  A  man,  who 
could  seriously  affect  not  to  recognize  his  own  son,  and  to 
put  questions  about  him  as  about  a  stranger,  must  have 
been  thoroughly  wanting  in  truth  of  character.  And  we 
may  be  assured,  that  no  depth  of  feeling  in  any  walk  of 
literature  or  poetry  ever  grew  upon  the  basis  of  radical 
affectation.  The  very  substratum  of  Lamb's  character, 
as  I  have  said  before,  lay  in  the  most  intense  hostility  to 
affectation.  This,  however,  touches  the  quality  of  their 
social  merits  ;  and  at  present  I  am  merely  concerned  with 
the  degree  ;  having  selected  La  Fontaine  as  that  one 
amongst  the  French  classics  who  best  expresses  by  anal- 
ogy the  true  position  and  relative  rank  which  the  voice  of 
posterity  will  assign  to  Charles  Lamb  in  the  literature  of 
his  own  country.  His  works  —  I  again  utter  my  convic- 
tion —  will  be  received  as  amongst  the  most  elaborately 
finished  gems  of  literature ;  as  cabinet  specimens  which 
express  the  utmost  delicacy,  purity,  and  tenderness  of  the 
^ational  intellect,  together  with  the  rarest  felicity  of  finish 
und  expression,  although  it  may  be  the  province  of  othe' 


RECOLLECTIONS  OF  CHARLES  LAMB.  135 


modes  of  literature  to  exhibit  the  highest  models  in  the 
grandeur  and  more  impassioned  forms  of  intellectual  power. 
Such  is  my  own  intimate  conviction ;  and,  accordingly,  I 
reckon  it  amongst  the  rarest  accidents  of  good  fortune 
which  have  gilded  my  literary  experience,  that,  although 
residing  too  often  at  a  vast  distance  from  the  metropolis  to 
benefit  oy  my  opportunities  so  much  as  I  desired,  yet,  by 
cultivating  those  which  fell  naturally  in  my  way  at  various 
periods,  but,  most  of  all,  at  that  period  when  I  may  con- 
sider my  judgment  to  have  been  maturest,  I  reaped  so 
much  delight  from  that  intercourse,  and  so  far  improved 
it  into  a  fiaternal  familiarity,  as  to  warrant  me  in  assum- 
ing the  honorable  distinction  of  having  been  a  friend  of 
Charles  Lamb.^ 

*  Among  the  prominent  characteristics  of  Lamb,  I  know  not  how  it 
i&  that  I  have  omitiea  lo  notice  the  peculiar  emphasis  and  depth  of 
his  courtesy.  This  quality  was  in  him  a  really  chivalrous  feeling, 
springing  from  his  heart,  and  cherished  with  the  sanctity  of  a  duty. 
He  says  somewhere  in  speaking  of  himself,  under  the  mask  of  a 
third  person,  whose  character  he  is  describing,  that,  in  passing  a 
servant  girl  even  at  a  street-crossing,  he  used  to  take  off  his  hat 
Now,  the  spirit  of  Lamb's  gallantry  would  have  prompted  some  such 
expression  of  homage,  though  the  customs  of  the  country  would  not 
allow  it  to  be  literally  fulfilled,  for  the  very  reason  that  would 
prompt  it  —  viz.  in  order  to  pay  respect  —  since  the  girl  would,  in 
such  a  case,  suppose  a  man  laughing  at  her  But  the  instinct  of  his 
heart  was  —  to  think  highly  of  female  nature,  and  to  pay  a  real 
homage  (not  the  hollow  demonstration  of  outward  honor,  which  a 
Frenchman  calls  his  *  homage,'  and  which  is  really  a  mask  for  con 
tempt)  to  the  sacred  idea  of  pure  and  virtuous  womanhood.  The 
one  sole  case  I  remember  in  which  Lamb  was  betrayed  into  —  not 
discourtesy  —  no,  that  could  not  be  —  but  into  a  necessity  of  pub- 
licly professing  a  hostile  feeling,  was  in  the  letter  (now  we  may 
^y  celeh fated  letter)  to  Mr.  Southey.  To  this,  however,  he  waa 
driven  nrt  by  any  hostile  feeling  towards  Southey,  but  simply  by  a 
ieeling  ttfxj  animated  of  sympathy  with  those  who  happened  to  be  on 
^[uestioii^  of  public  interest  hostile  to  Southey.    Lamb,  it  must  be 


136 


LTTEIIA.RY  KEMINISCENCES. 


remeiiibered,  was — thai  is,  he  called  himself — a  dissenter.  Was 
he  such  in  reality  ?  —  Not  at  all.  So  far  from  adopting  the  distinc- 
tions of  his  religious  party,  he  was  not  even  thoroughly  aware  of 
them.  But  with  Lamb  it  happened,  as  with  many  another  man, 
though  careless  of  the  distinctions  which  bound  him  to  a  party,  still 
he  was  in  profession  faithful  to  his  party,  as  a  principle  of  honor. 
T  know  many  men  at  this  day,  who,  if  left  to  choose  a  form  of  reli- 
gion —  left  unfettered  by  old  family  connections  —  would  much  pre- 
fer connecting  themselves  with  the  Church  of  England.  But  they  are 
restrained  and  kept  loyal  to  their  section  of  dissent,  not  by  religious 
considerations,  but  by  worldly  honor;  the  appealing  look  of  the 
clergyman,  resting  perhaps  his  influence  one  half  upon  old  household 
recollections  upon  the  father  whom  he  counselled,  the  grandfather 
he  prayed  with.  Such  look,  such  recollections,  who  could  resist  — 
who  ought  to  resist  ?  The  only  plan  is  this  :  when  the  old  minister 
dies  —  in  the  interregnum  —  whilst  as  yet  the  new  minister  is  not 
—  bolt,  cut  and  run.  Lamb's  situation  was  difficult;  Southey  as- 
sures us  that  he  knew  himself  to  be  wrong :  he  did  not.  Your 
penitent  Lamb  was  for  the  cfiur  of  Southey  —  he  never  meant  it  for  the 
world. 


WALLADMOB. 


137 


CHAPTER  V. 


WALLADMOR. 


Now  let  me  pass  to  a  part  of  my  London  literary  life, 
interesting  in  its  circumstances  ;  and  a  part  it  was  which 
interested  Charles  Lamb,  though  I  doubt  whether  he  ever 
went  so  far  in  his  interest  as  to  look  into  the  book  which 
records  my  share  in  the  affair.  This  affair  had  thus  far 
a  general  interest,  that  it  was  undoubtedly  the  most  com- 
plete hoax  that  ever  can  have  been  perpetrated.  The 
circumstances  are  these  :  — After  the  Author  of  '  Waver- 
ley  '  had  for  a  considerable  succession  of  years  delighted 
the  world  with  one  or  two  novels  annually,  the  demand 
for  Waverley  novels  came  to  be  felt  as  a  periodical 
craving  all  over  Europe  ;  just  as,  in  the  case  of  Napoleon, 
some  bloody  battle  by  land  or  by  sea  was  indispensable, 
after  each  few  months'  interval,  to  pacify  the  public  taste 
for  blood,  long  irritated  by  copious  gratification.  Now  it 
happened  in  1823  that  no  Waverley  novel  was  in  readi- 
ness, or  likely  to  be  in  readiness  for  the  Leipsic  Fair  at 
Michaelmas.  Upon  which  a  cry  arose  amongst  the  Ger- 
man booksellers  —  Forge  one  I  '  Presumptuous  enough 
that,'  the  reader  will  say.  Doubtless.  However,  the  thing 
was  done.  A  German,  and  (to  better  the  case)  a  German 
of  ultra-dulness,  set  to  work  upon  a  novel.  He  called  it 
•  Walladmor '  —  a  name,  by  the  way,  to  be  accented  not 
upon  the  penultimate,  '  Walladmor,'  but  upon  the  ante* 


138 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


penultimate  or  first  syllable  —  viz.  '  Walladmor/  as 
appears  from  the  old  rhymes  connected  with  the  tale  — 
e.g,:  — 

*  When  blackmen  storm  the  outer  door. 
Grief  shall  be  over  at  Walladmor; ' 

where  all  would  be  spoiled,  if  the  accent  were  thrown  on 
the  penultimate.  Well,  this  book  —  this  '  Walladmor 
made  its  appearance  in  the  German  language,  not  as  what 
it  really  was  —  a  German  novel,  written  by  a  German 
novelist  —  but  as  a  translation  from  an  English  original 
of  Sir  Walter  Scott.  In  this  character  it  appeared  at 
Leipsic ;  in  this  character  it  was  instantly  dispersed 
over  the  length  and  breadth  of  Germany  ;  and  in  this 
character  it  crossed  the  sea  to  London.  I  must  here  stop 
to  mention,  that  other  tricks  had  been  meditated  upon  Sir 
Walter  :  and  I  will  venture  to  say,  that,  sooner  or  later, 
one  of  these  tricks  will  be  tried.  In  a  country  like  Eng- 
land, where  (by  means  of  our  exquisite  organization 
through  newspapers,  &c.,  and  our  consequent  unity  of 
feeling)  an  author  may  acquire  a  more  intense  popularity, 
and  more  rapidly,  than  he  ever  can  upon  the  Continent, 
there  will  always  be  a  motive  for  pirating  such  an  author, 
or  for  counterfeiting  him,  beyond  what  is  ever  likely  to 
exist  upon  the  Continent.  In  Sir  Walter  Scott's  case,  it 
is  true,  there  was  a  mystery  which  added  greatly  to  the 
popularity.  But  still  it  strikes  me,  that,  simply  from  the 
unifying  powers  at  work  amongst  ourselves,  more  intense 
popularity  will  continually  arise  in  this  country  than  can 
elsewhere.  The  everlasting  reverberation  of  a  name  from 
Ck  dense  population,  furnished  with  the  artificial  means  for 
prolonging  and  repeating  the  echoes,  must  lead  to  a  result 
quite  inconceivable  amongst  the  non-conducting  and 
frittered  population  of  Germany.    There  will,  thereforo. 


WALLADMOB. 


arise  in  the  course  of  the  next  century,  continual  tempta- 
tions for  repeating  the  trick  of  counterfeiting,  and  also 
that  other  trick  meditated  upon  Sir  Walter  (or  rather 
upon  the  house  of.  Constable)  which  I  am  going  to  men- 
tion. —  It  had  been  much  agitated  *  in  Germany,  and  I 

*  This  was  a  question  almost  sure  to  be  suggested,  if  it  were  only 
by  the  intense  book-trade  interest  that  had  gradually  connected  itself 
with  the  priority  of  importation,  and  the  priority  of  translation,  on 
any  occasion  of  a  Waverley  novel.  Bribes  were  offered  by  commis- 
sion for  the  furtive  transmission  of  proof  sheets  from  the  Edinburgh 
press,  expresses  were  kept  sleeping  in  boots  and  spurs,  to  forward 
the  earliest  copies ;  translators  were  pre-occupied  by  retaining  fees; 
for  instance,  Lindau,  Methusalem,  Muller,  Dr.  Spieker,  Lotz,  Von 
Halem,  and  many  others;  and  between  these  translators,  the  most 
furious  races  were  run  —  all  in  order  to  insure  an  earlier  entrance 
into  the  market;  for,  though  Leipsic,  in  its  half-yearly  fairs,  was  the 
general  market,  still,  in  a  special  call  like  this,  there  were  extraor- 
dinary means  of  getting  into  circulation.  Hence,  and  from  a  compe- 
tition so  burning,  it  may  be  readily  supposed,  that  many  errors 
would  creep  into  the  translations;  and  especially  where  imperfect 
parts  of  volumes  happened  to  be  transmitted ;  of  which  there  is  an 
amusing  instance  mentioned  by  the  German  author  of  *  Walladmor,* 
in  his  dedication  to  Sir  Walter  Scott :  —  '  Ah,  Sir  AValter  !  did  you 
but  know  to  what  straits  the  poor  German  translator  of  a  Walter- 
Scottish  novel  is  reduced,  you  would  pardon  greater  liberties  than 
any  I  have  taken.  Ecoutez,  First  of  all,  comes  the  publisher,  and 
cheapens  a  translator  in  the  very  cheapest  market  of  translation- 
jobbers  that  can  be  supposed  likely  to  do  any  justice  to  the  work 
Next  come  the  sheets,  dripping  wet  from  the  Edinburgh  press,  with 
or  without  sense  and  connection,  just  as  chance  may  order  it.  Nay, 
it  happens  not  unfrequently  that,  if  a  sheet  should  chance  to  end 
with  one  or  two  syllables  of  an  unfinished  word,  we  Germans  are 
obliged  to  translate  this  first  instalment  of  a  future  meaning;  and, 
by  the  time  the  next  sheet  arrives  with  the  syllables  in  arrear,  we 
first  learn  into  what  confounded  scrapes  we  have  fallen,  by  guessing 
and  translating  at  hap-hazard.  JVbmina  sunt  odiosa  :  else  —  but  I 
Sbaii  content  myself  with  reminding  the  public  of  the  well  known  and 
lad  mishap  which  occurred  in  the  translation  of  Kenilworth.  This 


140 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


believe  also  in  France,  whether  —  if  a  translation  were 
made  of  a  Waverley  novel  into  a  foreign  language,  and 
afterwards  that  translation  (German  suppose,  or  French) 
were  translated  back  into  English  by  a  person  who  had 
never  seen  the  original,  and  who  consequently  would  give 
a  sufficient  coloring  of  difference  to  the  style  —  whether, 
I  say,  that  retranslation  might  not  be  lawfully  introduced 
into  England,  and  lawfully  sustain  itself  as  a  saleable 
commodity  in  the  character  of  a  foreign  book. 

Meantime,  whilst  this  suggestion  was  under  debate  —  a 
suggestion  which  applied  entirely  to  the  case  of  a  true 
Waverley  novel  —  one  bookseller  hit  upon  another  more 
directly  applying  to  the  present  case  of  September,  1824, 
the  unexpected  case  of  no  Waverley  novel  offering  to 
appear.  He,  therefore,  this  enterprising  bibliopole.  Her 
Herbig  of  Berlin,  resolved  to  have  one  forged  ;  and  with- 
out delay  he  hired  the  man  that  should  forge  it.  Well, 
this  forgery  was  perpetrated  ;  and,  the  better  to  hoax  the 

is  sufficiently  notorious.  Another  is  more  recent  —  I  will  relate  it : 
The  sheet,  as  it  was  received  from  Edinburgh,  closed  unfortunately 
thus  :  —  "  To  save  himself  from  these  disasters,  he  became  an  agent 
of  Smith-;  '*  and  we  all  translated  —  **  Um  sich  ans  diesen  triibselig^ 
keitan  zu  erreten  wurde  er  agent  bei  einem  Schmiedemeister;  " 
that  is,  he  became  foreman  to  a  blacksmith  Now,  sad  it  is  to  tell 
what  followed.  We  had  dashed  at  it,  and  we  waited  in  trembling 
hope  for  the  result.  Next  morning's  post  arrived,  and  showed  that 
all  Germany  had  been  basely  betrayed  by  a  catch-word  of  Mr.  Con- 
stable's. For  the  next  sheet  took  up  the  imperfect  catch-word  thus  : 
—  field  matches,  (i.  e.  Smithfield  matches,)  or  marriages  con- 
tracted for  money  and  the  German  sentence  should  have  been 
cobbled  and  put  to  rights  as  follows :  —  Er  negociste,  um  sich  aufzu- 
helfin,  die  sogenannten  Smithfields  heirathen,  &c.  Should  have 
been,  I  say;  but,  wo  is  me  for  all  Germany  !  it  was  too  late  ;  the 
translated  sheet  had  been  already  finished  off  with  the  blacksmith  it 
it  —  Heaven  confound  him  !  And  the  blacksmith  is  there  to  this  day 
and  cannot  be  ejected.' 


WALLADMOB, 


141 


Germaa  publiu,  in  tliree  volumes.  London  it  reached  on 
a  certain  day  in  the  autumn  of  1824,  towaids  the  close  of 
September  or  of  October,  I  really  forget  which ;  but  this 
I  remember,  that  there  was  barely  a  space  of  forty-eight 
hours  for  reading  and  reviewing  the  book,  a  book  of  a 
thousand  pages,  before  the  literary  journals  of  the  month 
would  be  closed  of  necessity  against  further  contributions. 
One  copy  only  had  been  received  as  yet  in  London;  and 
this  was  bespoke  for  Sir  Walter  Scott.  Somebody's  in- 
terest, I  know  not  whose,  procured  it  for  me,  as  a  man 
who  read  German  fluently ;  and  within  the  time  allowed, 
]  had  completed  a  tolerably  long  article  for  the  London 
Magazine,  It  may  be  supposed  that  reading  the  book 
was  quite  out  of  the  question,  for  one  who  had,  in  so  brief 
a  time,  to  write  a  long  paper  upon  it.  The  course  I 
pursued,  therefore,  was  this :  —  I  drew  up  a  somewhat 
rhetorical  account  of  the  German  hoax ;  explained  the 
drift  of  it;  and  then  gave  a  translation  of  such  passages 
as  had  happened  to  strike  me.  To  the  best  of  my  re- 
membrance, I  selected  three:  one,  the  opening  chapter, 
which  introduces  the  two  heroes  of  the  novel,  as  sole 
survivors  of  a  steamer  which  had  blown  up  in  the  Bristol 
Channel,  swimming  in  company,  then  engaged  in  a  mur- 
derous conflict  for  a  barrel,  and  finally  reconciled,  by 
mutual  acts  of  generosity,  into  giving  each  other  all  the 
assistance  within  their  power.  This  was  a  truly  German 
Bcene.  The  next  was  a  snow  storm  amongst  the  moun- 
tains of  Merionethshire,  and  not  without  some  interest. 
The  last  described  the  committal  of  a  principal  person  in 
the  tale  to  an  ancient  castle,  (Walladmor,)  on  a  charge  of 
treason.  And,  in  this  case,  the  incidetfts  moved  amongst 
picturesque  circumstances  of  mountain  scenery,  with  the 
%djuncts  of  storm  and  moonlight,  not  ill  described. 

How  it  could  have  happened,  I  do  not  know,  but  it  did 


142 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


happen,  that  I  had  stumbled  by  pure  accident  upon  almost 
every  passage  in  the  whole  course  of  the  thousand  pages 
which  could  be  considered  tolerable.  Naturally  enough, 
the  publishers  of  the  London  Magazine  were  encouraged 
by  these  specimens  to  hope  well  of  the  book;  and,  at 
their  request,  I  undertook  to  translate  it.  Confident  in  my 
powers  of  rapid  translation,  I  undertook  even  to  keep  up 
with  the  printer ;  three  sheets,  or  forty-eight  pages,  I 
made  sure  of  producing  daily ;  at  which  rate,  a  volume 
would  be  finished  in  a  week,  and  three  weeks  might  see 
the  whole  work  ready  for  the  public.  Never  was  there 
such  a  disappointment,  or  such  a  perplexity.  Not  until 
the  printing  had  actually  commenced,  with  arrangements 
for  keeping  several  compositors  at  work,  did  I  come  to 
understand  the  hopeless  task  I  had  undertaken.  Such 
rubbish  —  such  '  almighty  '  nonsense,  (to  speak  transaU 
lantice,)  —  no  eye  has  ever  beheld  as  nine  hundred  and 
fifty,  to  say  the  very  least,  of  these  thousand  pages.  To 
translate  them  was  perfectly  out  of  the  question;  tbe 
very  devils  and  runners  of  the  press  would  have  mutinied 
against  being  parties  to  such  atrocious  absurdities.  What 
was  to  be  done  ?  Had  there  been  any  ready  means  for 
making  the  publishers  aware  of  the  case  in  its  whole  ex- 
tent, probably  I  should  have  declined  the  engagement, 
but,  as  this  could  not  be  accomplished  without  reading 
half  a  volume  to  them,  I  thought  it  better  to  pursue  the 
task ;  mending  and  retouching  into  something  like  com- 
mon sense  wherever  that  was  possible ;  but  far  more 
frequently  forging  new  materials,  in  pure  despair  of 
mending  the  old;  and  reconstructing,  very  nearly,  the 
whole  edifice  from  the  foundation  upwards.  And  hence 
arose  this  singular  result :  that,  without  any  original  inten- 
tion to  do  so,  I  had  been  gradually  led  by  circumstances, 
to  build  upon  this  German  hoax  a  second  and  equally 


WALLADMOB. 


143 


complete  English  hoax.  The  German  '  Walladmor '  pro- 
fessed to  be  a  translation  from  the  English  of  Sir  Walter 
Scott;  my  'Walladmor'  professed  to  be  a  translation 
from  the  German ;  but,  for  the  reasons  I  have  given,  it 
was  no  more  a  translation  from  the  German  than  the 
German  from  the  English.  It  must  be  supposed  that 
writing  into  the  framework  of  another  man's  story  fear- 
fully cramped  the  freedom  of  my  movements  There 
were  absurdities  in  the  very  conduct  of  the  story  and  the 
development  of  the  plot,  which  could  not  always  be 
removed  without  more  time  than  the  press  allowed  me; 
for  I  kept  the  press  moving,  though  slowly;  namely,  at 
the  rate  of  half-a-sheet  (eight  pages)  a  day.  In  some 
instances,  I  let  the  incidents  stand,  and  contented  myself 
with  rewriting  every  word  of  the  ridiculous  narration,  and 
the  still  more  ridiculous  dialogues.  In  others,  I  recom- 
posed  even  the  incidents.  In  particular,  I  was  obliged  to 
put  in  a  new  catastrophe.  Upon  this  it  struck  me,  that 
certain  casuistical  doubts  might  arise,  as  to  the  relation 
which  I  held  to  my  German  principal,  which  doubts  I  thus 
expressed,  in  a  dedication  to  that  person :  — 

'  Having  some  intention,  sir,  of  speaking  rather  freely 
of  you  and  your  German  translation,  in  a  postscript  to  the 
second  volume  of  my  English  one,  I  am  shy  of  sending  a 
presentation  copy  to  Berlin.  Neither  you  nor  your  pub- 
lisher might  relish  all  that  I  may  take  it  into  my  head  to 
say.  Yet,  as  books  sometimes  travel  far,  if  you  should 
ever  happen  to  meet  with  mine  knocking  about  the  worla, 
in  Germany,  I  would  wish  you  to  know  that  I  have  en- 
deavored to  make  you  what  amends  I  could,  for  any 
little  affront  which  I  meditate  in  that  postscript,  by  dedi- 
cating my  English  translation  to  yourself.  You  will  be 
surprised  to  observe  that  your  three  corpulent  German 
Tolumes  have  collapsed  into  two  English  ones,  of  rathei 


144 


LITERAPY  KEMINISCENCES. 


consumptive  appearance.  The  English  climate,  you  see, 
does  not  agree  with  them ;  and  they  have  lost  flesh  as 
rapidly  as  Captain  le  Harnois,  in  chapter  the  eighth.  We 
have  a  story  in  England,  trite  enough  here,  and  a  sort  of 
philosophic  commonplace,  like  Buridan's  ass,  but  possi- 
bly unknown  in  Germany ;  and,  as  it  is  pertinent  to  the 
case  between  us,  I  will  tell  it,  the  more  so  as  it  involves  a 
metaphysical  question,  and  such  questions,  you  know, 
go  up  from  all  parts  of  Europe,  to  you  people  in  Ger- 
many, as  "the  courts  above."  Sir  John  Cutler  had  a 
pair  of  silk  stockings,  which  his  housekeeper,  Dolly, 
darned  for  a  long  term  of  years  with  worsted ;  at  the  end 
of  which  time,  the  last  gleam  of  silk  had  vanished,  and 
Sir  John's  silk  stockings  were  found  to  have  degenerated 
into  worsted.  Now,  upon  this  a  question  arose  amongst 
the  metaphysicians,  whether  Sir  John's  stockings  retained 
(or,  if  not,  at  what  precise  period  they  lost)  their  personal 
identity.  The  moralists  again  were  anxious  to  know, 
whether  Sir  John's  stockings  could  be  considered  the 
same  "  accountable "  stockings  from  first  to  last.  The 
lawyers  put  the  same  question  in  another  shape,  by  de- 
manding whether  any  felony  which  Sir  John's  stockings 
could  be  supposed  to  have  committed  in  youth,  might 
legally  be  the  subject  of  indictment  against  the  same 
stockings  when  superannuated  :  whether  a  legacy  left  to 
the  stockings  in  their  first  year,  could  be  claimed  by  them 
in  their  last ;  and  whether  the  worsted  stockings  could  be 
sued  for  the  debts  of  the  silk  stockings.  Some  such 
questions  will  arise,  I  apprehend,  upon  your  German 
"  Walladmor,"  as  darned  by  myself.  But  here,  my  good 
sir,  stop  a  moment.  I  must  not  have  you  interpret  the 
precedent  of  Sir  John  and  Dolly  too  strictly.  Sir  John's 
stockings  were  originally  of  silk,  and  darned  with  worsted 
but  don't  you  conceit  that  to  be  the  case  here.    No,  no 


WALLADMOR. 


145 


I  flatter  myself  the  case  between  us  is  just  the  other 
way.  Your  worsted  stockings  it  is  that  I  have  darned 
with  silk ;  and  the  relations  which  I  and  Dolly  bear  to  you 
and  Sir  John  are  precisely  inverted.  What  could  induce 
you  to  dress  good  St.  David  in  a  threadbare  suit,  it  passes 
my  skill  to  guess  —  it  is  enougli  that  I  am  sure  it  would 
give  general  disgust;  and,  therefore,  I  have  not  only 
made  him  a  present  of  a  new  coat,  but  have  also  put  a 
little  embroidery  upon  it.  And  I  really  think  I  shall 
astonish  the  good  folks  in  Merionethshire  by  my  account 
of  that  saint's  festival.  In  my  young  days,  I  wandered 
much  in  that  beautiful  shire,  and  other  shires  which  lie 
contiguous  ;  and  many  a  kind  thing  was  done  to  me  in 
poor  men's  cottages,  which,  to  my  dying  day,  I  shall 
never  be  able  to  repay  individually.  Hence,  as  occasions 
offer,  I  would  seek  to  make  my  acknowledgments  gen- 
erally to  the  country.  Upon  Penmorfa  sands,  I  once  had 
an  interesting  adventure  —  and  I  have  accordingly  com- 
memorated Penmorfa.  To  the  little  town  of  Machynleth, 
I  am  indebted  for  various  hospitalities ;  and  I  think 
Machynleth  will  acknowledge  itself  indebted  to  me  ex- 
clusively for  its  mayor  and  corporation.  Others  there  are 
besides,  in  that  neighborhood,  both  towns  and  men,  that 
when  they  shall  read  my  St.  David's  Day,  will  hardly 
know  whether  they  are  standing  on  their  head  or  their 
heels.  As  to  the  Bishop  of  Bangor,  of  those  same  days, 
I  owed  his  Lordship  no  particular  favor,  and,  therefore, 
you  will  observe,  I  have  now  taken  my  vengeance  on  that 
see  for  ever,  by  making  it  do  suit  and  service  to  the  house 
of  Walladmor.  But  enough  of  St.  David's  Day.  There 
are  some  other  little  changes  which  I  have  been  obliged  to 
make,  in  deference  to  the  taste  of  this  country.  In  the 
case  of  Captain  le  Harnois,  it  appears  to  me  that,  from 
'mperfect  knowledge  of  the  English  language,  you  have 
10 


146 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


confounded  the  words  "  sailor  "  and  tailor ;  "  for  you 
make  the  Capl  ain  talk  very  much  like  the  latter.  There 
is,  however,  a  great  deal  of  difference  in  the  habits  of  the 
two  animals,  according  to  our  English  naturalists  ;  and, 
therefore,  I  have  retouched  the  Captain,  and  curled  his 
whiskers.  I  have  also  taken  the  liberty  of  curing  Miss 
Walladmor  of  an  hysterical  affection.  What  purpose  it 
answered,  I  believe  you  would  find  it  hard  to  say ;  and  I 
am  sure  she  has  enough  to  bear  without  that.  Your 
geography,  let  me  tell  you,  was  none  of  the  best,  and  I 
have  brushed  it  up  myself.  Something  the  public  will 
bear  :  topographical  sins  are  venial  in  a  romance  ;  and  no 
candid  people  look  very  sharply  after  the  hydrography  of 
a  novel.  But  still,  my  dear  sir,  it  did  strike  me,  that  the 
case  of  a  man's  swimming  on  his  back  from  Bristol  to  the 
Isle  of  Anglesea,  was  a  little  beyond  the  privilege  granted 
by  the  most  maternal  public.  No,  pardon  me,  that  rather 
exceeds  the  public  swallow.  Besides,  it  would  have 
exposed  us  both  to  illiberal  attacks  in  the  Quarterly 
Review,  from  Mr.  Barrow  of  the  Admiralty,  your  weak 
point  being  his  strong  one  ;  and  particularly,  because  I 
had  taken  liberties  with  Mr.  Croker,*  who  is  a  colleague 
and  old  crony  of  his.  Your  chronology,  by  the  way,  was 
also  damaged  ;  but  that  has  gone  to  the  watchmaker's, 
and  it  is  now  regulated,  so  as  to  go  as  well  as  the  Horse- 
Guards.  Now,  finally,  "  Mine  dear  sare,'*  could  you  not 
translate  me  back  into  German,  and  darn  me  as  I  have 
darned  you  ?  But  you  must  not  sweat "  me  down  in  the 
same  ratio  that  I  have  "  sweated  "  you;  for  if  you  do  that, 
I  fear  that  my  "  dimensions  will  become  invisible  to  any 
thick  sight "  in  Germany,  and  I  shall  "  present  no  mark" 

*I  had  called  him  Ally  CrokeVy  in  allusion  to  an  old  joke  of  Mr. 
Bouthey,  Mr.  Croker  having  used  the  word  ally  and  allies  in  his  poem 
li  *  Talavera,'  inore  Hibernico,  with  the  accent  on  the  first  syllable 


WALLADMOR. 


147 


.0  the  critical  enemy.  Darn  me  into  two  portly  volumes ; 
unci,  then,  perhaps,  I  will  translate  you  back  again  into 
English,  and  darn  you  with  silk  so  hyperlustrous,  that 
were  Dolly  and  Professor  Kant  to  rise  from  the  dead, 
Dolly  should  grow  jealous  of  me,  and  the  professor  con- 
fess himself  more  thoroughly  puzzled  and  confounded,  as 
to  the  matter  of  personal  identity,  by  the  final  "  Wal- 
ladmor,"  than  ever  he  had  been  by  the  Cutlerian  stockings. 
Jusqu'  au  revoir,  my  dear  principal,  hoping  that  you  will 
soon  invest  me  with  that  character,  in  relation  to  yourself ; 
and  that  you  will  then  sign,  as  it  is  now  my  turn  to  sign 
—  Your  obedient  (but  not  very  faithful)  Translator.' 

It  will  be  observed  that,  in  this  dedication,  I  have  not 
ventured  to  state  the  nature  of  my  alterations,  in  th-eir 
w^hole  extent.  This  I  could  not  do  in  prudence  ;  for, 
though  I  should  really  have  made  myself  a  party  to  a 
gross  fraud  upon  the  public  purse,  by  smuggling  into 
circulation  a  load  of  hideous  trash,  under  the  momentary 
attraction  of  its  connection  with  Sir  Walter  Scott,  (an 
attraction  which  might  have  sold  one  edition  before  its 
nature  was  discovered)  —  though  I  could  not  do  this,  and 
therefore  took  the  only  honorable  course  open  to  me  in 
BO  strange  a  dilemma,  —  viz.  that  of  substituting  a 
readable,  and,  at  all  events,  not  dull  novel,  for  the  abortion 
I  had  been  betrayed  into  sanctioning  ;  yet  it  might  too 
much  have  repelled  readers,  if  I  had  frankly  stated 
beforehand,  the  extent  to  which  I  had  been  compelled  to 
recompose  this  German  hoax.  In  a  postscript,  however, 
when  the  reader  might  be  supposed  to  have  finished  the 
book,  I  spoke  a  little  more  plainly.  And,  as  there  will  be 
Bome  amusement  to  many  readers  in  what  I  said  —  which 
(owing  to  the  very  imperfect  publication  ^'  of  the  book)  is, 

♦  The  system  of  quack-pufifing,  applied  to  books,  and  above  all,  the 
irtifice  of  seducing  a  reader  into  the  reading  of  paragraphs  which 


£48 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


in  reality,  nearly  '  as  good  as  manuscript '  —  I  shall  here 
quote  a  part  of  it :  — ' "  £  quovis  ligno  nonfit  Mercurius^^ 
or,  to  express  this  Roman  proverb  by  our  own  homely 
oiie  —  "  You  cannot  make  a  silk  purse  out  of  a  sow's  ear.^^ 
Certainly  it  is  difficult  to  do  so,  and  none  can  speak  to 
that  more  feelingly  than  myself:  but  not  impossible,  as  I 
hope  that  my  "  Walladmor"  will  show  compared  with  the 
original.  This  is  a  point  which,  on  another  account, 
demands  a  word  or  two  of  explanation,  as  the  reader  will 
else  find  it  difficult  to  understand  upon  what  principle  of 
translation  three  thick-set  German  volumes  can  have 
shrunk  into  two  English  ones  of  somewhat  meagre  pro- 
portion.' —  I  then  go  on  to  explain,  that  the  German 
pseudo- Scott  had  chosen  three,  not  because  his  matter 
naturally  extended  so  far,  but  on  the  principle  of  exact 
imitation.  '  A  Scotch  novel  from  the  Constable  press, 
and  not  in  three  volumes,  would  have  been  detected  in 
limine  as  a  hoax  and  a  counterfeit.  Such  a  novel  would 
be  as  ominous  and  prodigious  as  "  double  Thebes  ;  "  as 
perverse  as  drinking  a  man's  health  with  two  times  two^ 
'which,  in  fact,  would  be  an  insult ;)  as  palpably  fraudu- 
lent as  a  subscription  of  £99  195.,  (where  it  would  be 
clear  that  some  man  had  pocketed  a  shilling  ;)  and  as 
contrary  to  all  natural  history  as  that  twenty-seven  tailors 
should  make  either  more  or  fewer  than  the  cube-root  of 
that  number.  What  may  be  the  occult  law  of  the  Con- 
stable press,  which  compels  it  into  these  three-headed 
births,  might  be  hard  to  explain.    Mr.  Kant  himself  with 

else  he  would  shun,  by  holding  out  false  expectation  in  the  heading 
—  all  this,  in  common  with  other  literary  men,  I  deem  disgraceful  to 
literature.  Such  practices  lower  an  honorable  profession  to  the  level 
9f  a  mechanic  trade.  But  the  system  of  soliciting  public  attentiou 
Dy  plain  unvarnished  advertisements  —  that  is  rendered  indispensa* 
able  to  the  publication  of  a  book.  That  wanting,  (as  in  *  Walladmor,'^ 
tiie  book  is  not  published. 


WALLADMOR. 


149 


nil  his  subtlety,  could  never  ir.ake  up  his  mind  in  his 
Konigsberg  lectures  on  that  subject  —  why  it  is  that  no 
man  thinks  of  presenting  a  lady  with  a  service  of  twenty- 
three  cups  and  saucers,  though  evidently  she  is  just  as 
likely  to  have  a  party  of  twenty- three  people  as  twenty- 
four.  Nay,  if  the  reader  himself  were  to  make  such  a 
present  to  an  English  grand  jury,  when  the  party  never 
could  be  more  than  twenty- three,  he  would  infallibly  order 
a  service  of  twenty-four,  though  he  must,  in  his  own 
conscience,  be  aware  that  the  twenty-fourth  cup  and 
saucer  was  a  mere  Irish  bull,  and  a  disgusting  pleonasm  ; 
a  twenty-fourth  grand  jury  man  being  as  entirely  a 
chimera  as  the  "  abstract  lord-mayor  "  of  Scriblerus  on  a 
30th  of  February.  Not  only  without  a  reason  therefore, 
but  even  against  reason,  people  have  a  superstitious 
regard  to  certain  numbers  ;  and  Mr.  Constable  has  a  right 
to  his  superstition,  which,  after  all,  may  be  the  classical 
one  —  that  three  happens  to  be  the  number  of  the 
Graces.' 

This  compliment,  by  the  way,  was  delicate  enough  to 
merit  an  acknowledgment  from  the  Constable  press.  So 
much  then  being  settled  —  that,  as  a  prima  facie  step 
towards  sustaining  the  hoax,  three  must  be  the  number  of 
the  volumes  —  I  then  went  on  to  say  :  —  *  But  what  if 
there  was  not  time  to  complete  so  many  volumes  so  as  to 
ftppear  at  the  Leipsic  Fair  ?  In  that  case,  two  men  must 
do  what  one  could  not.  Yet,  as  the  second  man  could 
not  possibly  know  what  his  leader  was  about,  he  must,  of 
necessity,  produce  his  under  stratum  without  the  least 
earthly  reference  to  the  upper ;  his  thorough  bass  without 
relation  to  the  melodies  in  the  treble.  This  was  awkward  ; 
i»nd,  to  meet  the  difficulty,  it  appears  to  me,  that  the 
upper  man  said  to  the  lower,  "  Write  me  a  huge  heap  of 
speeches  upon  politics  and  Welsh  genealogy,  write  me 


150 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


.oads  of  rubbish,  astrological,  cosmological  '  and  diaboli- 
cal,' (as  Mrs.  Malaprop  has  it:)  have  these  ready.  I, 
meantime,  have  two  characters  (Sir  Morgan  and  Mr. 
Dulberry  the  Radical)  upon  whom  I  can  hang  all  that  you 
WTite.  You  make  hooks  enough  —  I'll  make  eyes  ;  and, 
what  between  my  men  and  your  speeches,  my  eyes  and 
your  hooks,  it's  odds  but  we  make  a  very  pretty  novel." 
Such  I  conceive  to  have  been  the  pleasant  arrangement 
upon  which  the  machinery  was  worked,  so  as  to  fetch  up 
the  way  before  the  Michaelmas  Fair  began.  And  thus 
were  two  (perhaps  three)  men's  labor  dovetailed  into  one 
German  romance.  Aliter  non  Jit^  Avite,  liber.  When 
the  rest  of  the  rigging  was  complete,  the  politics,  gene- 
alogy, astrology,  &c.,  were  mounted  as  "  royals "  and 
"  sky-scrapers,"  the  ship  weighed,  and  soon  after  made 
Leipsic  and  London  under  a  press  of  sail.'  Then,  having 
protested  that  this  trash  was  absolutely  beyond  hope,  and 
that  I  should  have  made  myself  a  party  to  the  author's 
folly  or  his  knavery  by  translating  it,  I  offered,  however, 
in  the  case  of  my  reader's  complaining  of  these  large 
retrenchments,  to  translate  the  whole  for  a  '  considera- 
tion ; '  to  cast  it  upon  the  complainant's  premises,  and  to 
shovel  it  into  the  coal-cellar,  or  any  more  appropriate 
place.  But  thus,  I  explained,  did  in  fact  arise  the  differ- 
ence in  size,  as  well  as  quality,  between  the  German  and 
the  English  '  Walladmor.'  And  henceforwards  I  shall 
think  the  better  of  the  German  author  as  well  as  myself 
BO  long  as  I  live  ;  of  him  for  an  unrivalled  artist  of  sows' 
ears,  and  of  myself  for  a  very  respectable  manufacturer  of 
*ilk  purses. 

Thus  much  to  account  for  my  omissions ;  which, 
aowever,  some  readers  may  facetiously  regard,  far  from 
needing  apology,  as  my  only  merits  ;  and  that  would  be 
la  cruel  as  Lessing's  suggestion  to  an  author  for  his  table 


WALLADMOK. 


151 


bf  eriata  —  *  Apropos  of  errata,  suppose  you  were  to  put 
yoav  whole  book  into  the  list  of  errata.'  More  candid 
readers,  I  am  inclined  to  hope,  will  blame  me  for  not 
having  made  even  larger  alterations  in  the  book  ;  and 
thai  would  be  a  flattering  critique,  as  it  must  presume 
that  I  could  have  improved  it ;  and  compliment  never 
wears  so  delightful  an  aspect  as  when  it  takes  the  shape 
of  blame.  The  truth  is,  I  have  altered  ;  yes,  altered  and 
altered,  until  I  became  alarmed.  The  ghost  of  Sir  John 
Cutler,  of  Sir  John's  stockings,  of  Sir  Francis  Drake's 
ship  —  nay,  of  Jason's  ship,  and  older  ghosts  even  than 
these  —  all  illustrating  the  same  perplexing  question, 
began  to  haunt  me.  Metaphysical  doubts  fell  upon  me, 
and  I  came  to  fear  that,  if  to  a  new  beginning  and  a  new 
catastrophe,  I  were  to  add  a  new  middle,  possibly  there 
might  come  some  evil-minded  person  who  might  say  that 
I  also  was  a  hoaxer,  an  English  hoaxer  building  upon  a 
German  hoaxer.  Then  I  paused.  But  still  I  have  gone 
too  far ;  for  it  is  a  most  delicate  operation  to  take  work 
out  of  another  man's  loom  and  put  work  in  ;  joinings  and 
sections  will  sometimes  appear ;  colors  will  not  always 
match.  In  general  I  would  request  the  reader  to  consider 
himself  indebted  to  me  for  anything  he  may  find  par- 
ticularly good  ;  and,  in  any  cas3,  to  load  my  unhappy 
'  principal '  with  the  blame  of  everything  that  is  wrong 
Coming  upon  any  passage  which  he  thinks  superlatively 
bad,  let  him  be  assured  that  I  had  no  hand  in  it.  Should 
he  change  his  opinion  upon  it,  I  may  be  disposed  to 
reconsider  whether  I  had  not  some  hand  in  it.  This  will 
be  the  more  reasonable  in  him,  as  the  critics  will  '  feel  it 
their  duty '  (oh  !  of  course,  '  their  duty  ')  to  take  the  very 
opposite  course.  However,  if  he  reads  German,  my 
Gevman  '  Walladmor'  is  at  his  service,  and  he  can  judge 
^or  himself.    Net  reading  German,  let  him  take  my  word, 


152 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


when  I  apply  to  the  English  *  Walladmor '  the  spuit  of 
the  old  bull :  — 

« Had  you  seen  but  these  roads  before  they  were  made, 
You  would  lift  up  your  eyes,  and  bless  Marshal  Wade.' 

Here  closed  my  explanations ;  but,  as  a  V envoy  or  quod 
bene  vortat  to  the  whole  concern,  I  added  something  —  a 
valediction  and  an  ave  in  the  same  breath  —  which,  for 
the  sake  of  the  Spenserian  allusion,  many  people  will 
relish  ;  and  even  yet  I  pique  myself  upon  it  as  a  felicitous 
passage.  It  began  with  a  quotation  ;  and  this  quotation, 
as  pretty  broadly  I  hinted,  was  from  myself — myself  as 
the  reviewer  in  the  London  Magazine,    Thus  it  was :  — 

'  A  friend  of  mine '  (so  we  all  say  when  we  are  looking 
out  for  some  masquerade  dress  under  which  to  praise 
ourselves,  or  to  abuse  some  dear  friend,)  '  a  friend  of 
mine  has  written  a  very  long  review  (or  analysis  rather) 
of  the  German  "  Walladmor,"  in  a  literary  journal  of  the 
metropolis.  He  concludes  with  the  following  passage, 
which  I  choose  to  quote  on  account  of  the  graceful 
allusion  it  contains,  partly  also  because  it  gives  me  an 
opportunity  for  trying  my  hand  at  an  allusion  to  the  same 
romantic  legend:  —  "Now,  turning  back  from  the  hoaxer 
to  the  hoax,  we  shall  conclude  with  this  proposition  :  — 
All  readers  of  Spenser  must  know  that  the  true  Florimel 
lost  her  girdle,  which,  they  will  remember,  was  found  by 
Sir  Satyrane,  and  was  adjudged  by  a  whole  assemblage  of 
knights  to  the  false  Florimel,  although  it  did  not  quite  fi 
her.    She  —  viz.  the  snowy  or  false  Florimel  — 

"  exceedingly  did  fret; 
And,  snatching  from  his  hand  half  angrily 
The  belt  again,  about  her  body  'gan  it  tie. 
Yet  nathemore  would  it  her  body  fit; 
Yet  natheless  to  her,  as  her  due  right, 
It  yielded  was  by  them  that  judged  it.*" 

Faery  Queen e,  b.  iv  a  5 


ajLMUEL  TAYLOB  COLERIDGE. 


CHAPTER  VI. 


SAMUEL  TAYLOR  COLERIDGE. 


It  was,  I  think,  in  the  month  of  August,  hut  certainly 
in  the  summer  season,  and  certainly  in  the  year  1807, 
that  I  first  saw  this  illustrious  man,  the  largest  and  most 
Bpacious  intellect,  the  subtlest  and  the  most  comprehen- 
fiive,  in  my  judgment,  that  has  yet  existed  amongst  men. 
My  knowledge  of  him  as  a  man  of  most  original  genius 
began  about  the  year  1799.  A  little  before  that  tim^, 
Mr.  Wordsworth  had  published  the  first  edition  (in  a 
single  volume)  of  the  '  Lyrical  Ballads,'  at  the  end  or  the 
beginning  of  which  was  placed  Mr.  Coleridge's  poem  of 
the  •  Ancient  Mariner,'  as  the  contribution  of  an  anony- 
mous friend.  It  would  be  directing  the  reader's  attention 
too  much  to  myself,  if  I  were  to  linger  upon  this,  the 
greatest  event  in  the  unfolding  of  my  own  mind.  Let 
me  say  in  one  word,  that,  at  a  period  when  neither  the 
one  nor  the  other  writer  was  valued  by  the  public  —  both 
having  a  long  warfare  to  accomplish  of  contumely  and 
ridic-'jle  before  they  could  rise  into  their  present  estima- 
tion —  I  found  in  these  poems  '  the  ray  of  a  new  morning,' 
and  an  absolute  revelation  of  untrodden  worlds,  teeming 
with  power  and  beauty,  as  yet  unduspected  amongst  men. 
I  may  here  mention  that,  precisely  at  the  same  time,  Pro- 
fessor Wilson,  about  the  same  age  as  myself,  received  the 
lame  startling  and  profound  impressions  from  the  same 


I5i 


LITERABY  REMINISCENCES. 


volume.  With  feelings  of  reverential  interest,  so  early 
and  so  deep,  pointing  towards  two  contemporaries,  it  may 
be  supposed  that  I  inquired  eagerly  after  their  names. 
But  these  inquiries  were  self-baffled,  the  same  deep  feel- 
ings which  prompted  my  curiosity,  causing  me  to  recoil 
from  all  casual  opportunities  of  pushing  the  inquiry,  as 
too  generally  lying  amongst  those  who  gave  no  sign  of 
participating  in  my  feelings ;  and,  extravagant  as  it  may 
seem,  I  revolted  with  as  much  hatred  from  coupling  my 
question  with  any  occasion  of  insult  to  the  persons  whom 
it  respected,  as  a  primitive  Christian  from  throwing 
frankincense  upon  the  altars  of  Caesar,  or  a  lover  from 
giving  up  the  name  of  his  beloved  to  the  coarse  license 
of  a  Bacchanalian  party.  It  is  laughable  to  record  for 
how  long  a  period  my  curiosity  in  this  particular  was 
self-defeated.  Two  years  passed  before  I  ascertained  the 
two  names.  Mr.  Wordsworth  published  his  in  the  second 
and  enlarged  edition  of  the  work  ;  and  for  Mr.  Coleridge's 
I  was  '  indebted '  to  a  private  source  ;  but  I  discharged 
that  debt  ill,  for  I  quarrelled  wdth  my  informant  for  what 
I  considered  his  profane  way  of  dealing  with  a  subject 
so  hallowed  in  my  own  thoughts.  After  this  I  searched 
east  and  west,  north  and  south,  for  all  known  works  or 
fragments  of  the  same  authors.  I  had  read,  therefore, 
as  respects  Mr.  Coleridge,  the  Allegory  which  he  con- 
tributed to  Mr.  Southey's  Joan  of  Arc.  I  had  read  his 
fine  Ode,  entitled  France,  his  Ode  to  the  Duchess  of 
Devonshire,  and  various  other  contributions,  more  or 
less  interesting,  to  the  two  volumes  of  the  '  Anthology,' 
published  at  Bristol,  about  1799  - 1800,  by  Mr.  Southey ; 
and,  finally,  I  had  of  course,  read  the  small  volume  of 
poems  which  passed  under  his  name :  these,  however,  a9 
a  juvenile  and  immature  work,  had  in  general  greatly  dis- 
^ppoirted  me. 


SAMUEL  TAYLOR  COLERIDGE. 


155 


Meantime,  it  had  crowned  the  interest  which  to  me 
jivested  his  name  —  that  about  the  year  1804  or  1805, 
I  had  been  informed  by  a  gentleman  from  the  English 
lakes,  who  knew  him  as  a  neighbor,  that  he  had  for  some 
time  applied  his  whole  mind  to  metaphysics  and  psychol- 
ogy—  which  happened  to  be  my  own  absorbing  pursuit. 
From  1803  to  1808,  I  was  a  student  at  Oxford;  and  on 
the  first  occasion,  when  I  could  conveniently  have  sought 
for  a  personal  knowledge  of  one  whom  I  contemplated 
with  so  much  admiration,  I  was  met  by  a  disgusting  as- 
surance that  he  had  quitted  England,  and  was  then 
residing  at  Malta  in  the  quality  of  secretary  (and  occa- 
sionally as  treasurer)  to  the  Governor.  I  began  to  inquire 
about  the  best  route  to  Malta ;  but,  as  any  route  at  that 
time  promised  an  inside  place  in  a  French  prison,  I  recon- 
ciled myself  to  waiting ;  and  at  last,  happening  to  visit  a 
relative  at  the  Bristol  Hot-wells,  in  the  summer  of  1807, 
I  had  the  pleasure  to  hear  that  Mr.  Coleridge  was  not 
only  once  more  upon  English  ground,  but  within  forty 
and  odd  miles  of  my  own  station.  In  that  same  hour  I 
mounted  and  bent  my  way  to  the  south ;  and  before 
evening  reaching  a  ferry  on  the  river  Bridgewater,  at  a 
village  called,  I  think,  Stogursey,  (^.  e.  Stoke  de  Courcy, 
by  way  of  distinction  from  some  other  Stoke.)  I  crossed 
it,  and  a  few  miles  further  attained  my  object,  viz.  the 
little  town  of  Nether  Stowey,  amongst  the  Quantock  hills. 
Here  I  had  been  assured  that  I  should  find  Mr.  Coleridge, 
at  the  house  of  his  old  friend  Mr.  Poole.  On  presenting 
myself,  however,  to  that  gentleman,  I  found  that  Coleridge 
was  absent  at  Lord  Egmont's,  an  elder  brother  (by  the 
father's  side)  of  Mr.  Percival  the  minister,  assassinated 
five  years  after ;  and  as  it  was  doubtful  whether  he  might 
fiot  then  be  on  the  wing  to  another  friend's  in  the  town 
of  Bridgewater,  I  consented  willingly,  until  his  motionu 


156 


LITERAKT  REMINISCENCES. 


Ehould  be  ascertained,  to  stay  a  day  or  two  with  this  Mr. 
Poole,  —  a  man  on  his  own  account  well  deserving  a 
separate  notice ;  for,  as  Coleridge  afterwards  remarked  to 
me,  he  was  almost  an  ideal  model  for  a  useful  member 
of  Parliament,  He  was  a  stout,  plain-looking  farmer, 
leading  a  bachelor  life,  in  a  rustic  old-fashioned  house ; 
the  house,  however,  upon  further  acquaintance,  proving 
to  be  amply  furnished  with  modern  luxuries,  and  espe- 
cially with  a  good  library,  superbly  mounted  in  all 
departments  bearing  at  all  upon  political  philosophy ;  and 
the  farmer  turning  out  a  polished  and  liberal  Englishman, 
who  had  travelled  extensively,  and  had  so  entirely 
dedicated  himself  to  the  service  of  his  humble  fellow- 
countrymen,  the  hewers  of  wood  and  drawers  of  water 
in  this  southern  region  of  Somersetshire,  that  for  many 
miles  round  he  was  the  general  arbiter  of  their  disputes, 
the  guide  and  counsellor  of  their  daily  lives ;  besides 
being  appointed  executor  and  guardian  to  his  children  by 
every  third  man  who  died  in  or  about  the  town  of  Nether 
Stowey. 

The  first  morning  of  my  visit,  Mr.  Poole  was  so  kind 
as  to  propose,  knowing  my  admiration  of  Wordsworth, 
that  we  should  ride  over  to  Alfoxton,  —  a  place  of  singular 
interest  to  myself,  as  having  been  occupied  in  his  unmar- 
ried days  by  that  poet,  during  the  minority  of  Mr.  St, 
Aubyn,  its  present  youthful  proprietor.  At  this  delightful 
spot,  the  ancient  residence  of  an  ancient  English  family 
and  surrounded  by  those  ferny  Quantock  hills  which  are 
80  beautifully  sketched  in  the  poem  of  Ruth,  Wordsworth, 
accompanied  by  his  sister,  had  passed  the  whole  of  the 
interval  between  leaving  the  University  (Cambridge),  ana 
the  period  of  his  final  settlement  amongst  his  native  lakes 
of  Westmoreland,  except  only  one  year  spent  in  France, 
f^me  months  in  North  Germany,  and  a  space,  I  know  no 
now  long,  spent  at  Race  Down  in  Dorsetshire. 


SAMUEL  TAYLOK  COLERIDGE. 


157 


Returning  late  from  this  interesting  survey,  we  found 
ourselves  without  company  at  dinner ;  and,  being  thus 
seated  tete-d-tete,  Mr.  Poole  propounded  the  following 
question  to  me,  which  I  mention,  because  it  furnished  me 
with  the  first  hint  of  a  singular  infirmity  besetting  Coler- 
idge's mind  :  — '  Pray,  my  young  friend,  did  you  ever 
form  any  opinion,  or  rather  —  did  it  ever  happen  to  you  to 
meet  with  any  rational  opinion  or  conjecture  of  others, 
upon  that  most  irrational  dogma  of  Pythagoras  about 
beans  ?  You  know  what  I  mean  :  that  monstrous  doctrine 
in  which  he  asserts  that  a  man  might  as  well,  for  the 
wickedness  of  the  thing,  eat  his  own  grandmother  as 
meddle  with  beans.'  '  Yes,'  I  replied  :  '  the  line  is  in  the 
Golden  Verses.    I  remember  it  well.' 

P.  —  '  True  :  now  our  dear  excellent  friend  Coleridge, 
than  whom  God  never  made  a  creature  more  divinely 
endowed,  yet  strange  it  is  to  say.  sometimes  steals  from 
other  people,  just  as  you  or  I  might  do ;  I  beg  your 
pardon — just  as  a  poor  creature  like  myself  might  do, 
that  sometimes  have  not  wherewithal  to  make  a  figure 
from  my  own  exchequer :  and  the  other  day,  at  a  dinner- 
party, this  question  arising  about  Pythagoras  and  his 
beans,  Coleridge  gave  us  an  interpretation,  which,  from 
his  manner,  I  suspect  to  have  been  not  original.  Think, 
therefore,  if  you  have  anywhere  read  a  plausible  solu- 
tion.' 

'  I  have  :  and  it  was  in  a  German  author.  This  Ger- 
man, understand,  is  a  poor  stick  of  a  man,  not  to  be  named 
on  the  same  day  with  Coleridge :  so  that,  if  it  should  ap- 
pear that  Coleridge  has  robbed  him,  be  assured  that  he 
has  done  the  scamp  too  much  honor.' 

P.  — '  Well :  what  says  the  German  ? ' 

'  Why,  you  know  the  use  made  in  Greece  of  beans  in 
voting  and  balloting?     Welli    the  German  says  that 


158 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


Pytltagoras  speaks  symbolically;  meaning  that  elec« 
tioneering,  or,  more  generally,  all  interference  with 
political  intrigues,  is  fatal  to  a  philosopher's  pursuits  and 
their  appropriate  serenity.  Therefore,  says  he,  follower 
of  mine,  abstain  from  public  affairs  as  you  would  from 
parricide.' 

P. — *Well  then,  Coleridge  has  done  the  scamp  too 
much  honor:  for,  by  Jove,  that  is  the  very  explanation 
he  gave  us ! ' 

Here  was  a  trait  of  Coleridge's  mind,  to  be  first  made 
known  to  me  by  his  best  friend,  and  first  published  to  the 
world  by  me,  the  foremost  of  his  admirers !  But  both  of 
us  had  sufiicient  reasons :  —  Mr.  Poole  knew  that,  stumbled 
on  by  accident,  such  a  discovery  would  be  likely  to  im- 
press upon  a  man  as  yet  unacquainted  with  Coleridge  a 
most  injurious  jealousy  with  regard  to  all  he  might  write ; 
whereas,  frankly  avowed  by  one  who  knew  him  best,  the 
fact  was  disarmed  of  its  sting ;  since  it  thus  became  evi- 
dent that  where  the  case  had  been  best  known  and  most 
investigated,  it  had  not  operated  to  his  serious  disadvan- 
tage. On  the  same  argument,  to  forestall,  that  is  to  say, 
other  discoverers  who  would  make  a  more  unfriendly  use 
of  the  discovery,  and  also,  as  matters  of  literary  curiosity, 
I  shall  here  point  out  a  few  of  Coleridge's  unacknowledged 
obligations,  detected  by  myself  in  a  very  wide  course  of 
reading.^ 

1.  The  hymn  to  ChamcMni  is  an  expansion  of  a  short 
poem  in  stanza?,  upon  the  same  subject,  by  Frederica 
Brun,  a  female  poet  of  Germany,  previously  known  to 
the  world  under  her  maiden  name  of  Miinter.  The  mere 
framework  of  the  poem  is  exactly  the  same,  —  an  appeal 
to  the  most  impressive  features  of  the  regal  mountain, 
(Mont  Blanc,)  citing  them  to  proclaim  their  author :  the 
orrent,  for  instance,  is  required  to  say,  by  whom  it  had 


SAMUEL  TAYLOR  COLERIDGE. 


159 


been  arrested  in  its  headlong  ravings,  and  stiffened,  as  by 
the  petrific  mace  of  Death,  into  everlasting  pillars  of  ice ; 
and  the  answer  to  these  impassioned  apostrophes  is  made 
by  the  same  choral  burst  of  rapture.  In  mere  logic, 
therefore,  and  even  as  to  the  choice  of  circumstances, 
Coleridge's  poem  is  a  translation.  On  the  other  hand,  by 
a  judicious  amplification  of  some  topics,  and  by  its  far 
deeper  tone  of  lyrical  enthusiasm,  the  dry  bones  of  the 
German  outline  have  been  created  by  Coleridge  into  the 
fulness  of  life.  It  is  not,  therefore,  a  paraphrase,  but  a 
recast  of  the  original.  And  how  was  this  calculated,  if 
frankly  avowed,  to  do  Coleridge  any  injury  with  the 
judicious  ? 

2.  A  more  singular  case  of  Coleridge's  infirmity  is 
this :  —  In  a  very  noble  passage  of  '  France '  a  fine 
expression  or  two  occur  from  '  Samson  Agonistes.'  Now 
to  take  a  phrase  or  an  inspiriting  line  from  the  great 
fathers  of  poetry,  even  though  no  marks  of  quotation 
should  be  added,  carries  with  it  no  charge  of  plagiarism, 
Milton  is  presumed  to  be  as  familiar  to  the  ear  as  nature 
to  the  eye;  and  to  steal  from  him  as  impossible  as  to 
appropriate,  or  sequester  to  a  private  use,  some  '  bright 
particular  star.'  And  there  is  a  good  reason  for  rejecting 
the  typographical  marks  of  quotation :  they  break  the 
continuity  of  the  passion,  by  reminding  the  reader  of  a 
printed  book ;  on  which  account  Milton  himself,  (to  give 
an  instance,)  has  not  marked  the  sublime  words,  '  tor- 
mented all  the  air,'  as  borrowed ;  nor  has  Wordsworth, 
in  applying  to  an  unprincipled  woman  of  commanding 
beauty  the  memorable  expression,  '  a  weed  of  glorious 
feature,'  thought  it  necessary  to  acknowledge  it  as 
originally  belonging  to  Spenser.  Some  dozens  of  similar 
cases  might  be  adduced  from  Milton.  But  Mr.  Coleridge, 
m  describing  France  as 

« Her  footsteps  insupportably  advancing,' 


160 


LITEBAHY  REMINISCENCES. 


not  satisfied  with  omitting  the  marks  of  acknowledgmenU 
thought  fit  positively  to  deny  that  he  was  indebted  to 
Milton.  Yet  who  could  forget  that  semi-chorus  in  the 
*  Samson/  where  the  '  bold  Ascalonite '  is  described  as 
having  *  fled  from  his  lion  ramp?'  Or  who,  that  was 
not  in  this  point  liable  to  some  hallucination  of  judgment, 
would  have  ventured  on  a  public  challenge  (for  virtually 
it  was  that)  to  produce  from  the  *  Samson,'  words  so 
impossible  to  be  overlooked  as  those  of  *  insupportably 
advancing  the  footsteps  ? '  The  result,  as  I  remember, 
was,  that  one  of  the  critical  journals  placed  the  two  pas- 
sages in  juxta-position,  and  left  the  reader  to  his  own 
conclusions  with  regard  to  the  poet's  veracity.  But  in 
this  instance,  it  was  common  sense  rather  than  veracity 
which  the  facts  impeach. 

3.  In  the  year  1810  I  happened  to  be  amusing  my- 
self, by  reading,  in  their  chronological  order,  the  great 
classical  circumnavigations  of  the  earth  ;  and,  coming  to 
Shelvocke,  I  met  with  a  passage  to  this  effect :  —  That 
Hatley,  his  second  captain,  (^.  e.  lieutenant,)  being  a 
melancholy  man,  was  possessed  by  a  fancy  that  some  long 
season  of  foul  weather  was  due  to  an  albatross  which  had 
steadily  pursued  the  ship ;  upon  which  he  shot  the  bird, 
but  without  mending  their  condition.  There  at  once  I 
saw  the  germ  of  the  '  Ancient  Mariner ;  *  and  I  put  a 
question  to  Coleridge  accordingly.  Could  it  have  been 
imagined  that  he  would  see  cause  utterly  to  disown  so 
slight  an  obligation  to  Shelvocke  ?  Wordsworth,  a  man 
of  stern  veracity,  on  hearing  of  this,  professed  his  ina- 
bility to  understand  Coleridge's  meaning ;  the  fact  being 
notorious,  as  he  told  me,  that  Coleridge  had  derived,  from 
the  very  passage  I  had  cited,  the  original  hint  for  the 
action  of  the  poem ;  though  it  is  very  possible,  from 
iomething  which  Coleridge  said,  on  another  occasion,  thatj 


SAMUEL  TAYLOR  COLERIDGE. 


161 


before  meeting  a  fable  in  which  to  embody  his  Ldeap,  he 
had  meditated  a  poem  on  delirium,  confounding  its  own 
dream  scenery  with  external  things,  and  connected  with 
the  imagery  of  high  latitudes. 

4.  All  these  cases  amount  to  nothing  at  all  as  cases  of 
plagiarism,  and  for  that  reason  expose  the  more  con- 
spicuously that  obliquity  of  feeling  which  could  seek  to 
decline  the  very  slight  acknowledgments  required.  But 
now  I  come  to  a  case  of  real  and  palpable  plagiarism  ; 
yet  that  too  of  a  nature  to  be  quite  unaccountable  in  a  man 
of  Coleridge's  attainments.  It  is  not  very  likely,  that  this 
particular  case  will  soon  be  detected  ;  but  others  will. 
Yet  who  knows  ?  Eight  hundred  or  a  thousand  years 
hence,  some  cursed  reviewer  may  arise,  who  having  read 
the  Biographia  Literaria  of  Coleridge,  will  afterwards 
read  the  Miscellaneous  Philosophical  Essays  of  Schel- 
ling,  the  great  Bavarian  professor  —  a  man  in  some 
respects  worthy  to  be  Coleridge's  assessor;  and  he  will 
then  make  a  singular  discovery.  In  the  '  Biographia 
Literaria '  occurs  a  dissertation  upon  the  reciprocal 
relations  of  the  Esse  and  the  Cogitare ;  and  an  attempt 
is  made,  by  inverting  the  postulates  from  which  the 
argument  starts,  to  show  how  each  might  arise  as  a 
product,  by  an  intelligible  genesis,  from  the  other.  It  is 
a  subject,  which,  since  the  time  of  Fichte,  has  much 
occupied  the  German  metaphysicians  ;  and  many  thou- 
sands of  essays  have  been  written  on  it,  of  which  many 
hundreds  have  been  read  by  many  tens  of  persons. 
Coleridge's  essay,  in  particular,  is  prefaced  by  a  few 
words,  in  which,  aware  of  his  coincidence  with  Schelling, 
he  declares  his  willingness  to  acknowledge  himself  in- 

*  I  forget  the  exact  title,  not  having  seen  the  book  since  1828,  and 
then  only  for  one  day;  but  I  believe  it  was  Schelling's  Kleine  Philo- 
wphische  Werke. 

11 


162 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


debted  to  so  great  a  man,  in  any  case  where  the  truth 
would  allow  him  to  do  so  ;  but  in  this  particular  case, 
insisting  on  the  impossibility  that  he  could  have  borrowed 
arguments  which  he  had  first  seen  some  years  after  he  had 
thought  out  the  whole  hypothesis  propria  marte.  After 
this,  what  was  my  astonishment,  to  find  that  the  entire 
essay  from  the  first  word  to  the  last,  is  a  verbatim  transla- 
tion from  Schelling,  with  no  attempt  in  a  single  instance 
to  appropriate  the  paper,  by  developing  the  arguments  or 
by  diversifying  the  illustrations  !  Some  other  obligations  to 
Schelling  of  a  slighter  kind,  I  have  met  with  in  the  Bio- 
graphia  Liter  aria  ;  but  this  was  a  barefaced  plagiarism, 
which  could  in  prudence  have  been  risked  only  by  relying 
too  much  upon  the  slight  knowledge  of  German  literature 
in  this  country,  and  especially  of  that  section  of  the  Ger- 
man literature.  Had  then  Coleridge  any  need  to  borrow 
from  Schelling  ?  Did  he  borrow  in  forma  pauperis  7 
Not  at  all :  —  there  lay  the  wonder.  He  spun  daily  and 
at  all  hours,  for  mere  amusement  of  his  own  activities, 
and  from  the  loom  of  his  own  magical  brain,  theories 
more  gorgeous  by  far,  and  supported  by  a  pomp  and 
luxury  of  images,  such  as  Schelling  —  no,  nor  any  Ger- 
man that  ever  breathed,  not  John  Paul  —  could  have 
emulated  in  his  dreams.  With  the  riches  of  El  Dorado 
lying  about  him,  he  would  condescend  to  filch  a  handful 
of  gold  from  any  man  whose  purse  he  fancied  ;  and  ir 
fact  reproduced  in  a  new  form,  applying  itself  to  intel- 
lectual wealth,  that  maniacal  propensity  which  is  some- 
times well  known  to  attack  enormous  proprietors  and 
millionaires  for  acts  of  petty  larceny.    The  last  Duke  of 

Anc  could  not  abstain  from  exercising  his  furtive 

mania  upon  articles  so  humble  as  silver  spoons  ;  and  it 
was  the  daily  care  of  a  pious  daughter,  watching  over  the 
g^ood  name  of  her  father,  to  have  his  pockets  searched  by 


SAMUEL  TATLOH  COLERIDGE. 


163 


a  confidential  valet,  and  the  claimants  of  the  purloined 
articles  traced  out. 

Many  cases  have  crossed  me  in  life  of  people,  otherwise 
not  wanting  in  principle,  who  had  habits,  or  at  least 
hankerings,  of  the  same  kind.  And  the  phrenologists,  I 
believe,  are  well  acquainted  with  the  case,  its  signs,  its 
progress,  and  its  history.  Dismissing,  however,  this  sub- 
ject, which  I  have  at  all  noticed,  only  that  I  might 
anticipate  and  (in  old  English)  that  I  might  prevent  the 
uncandid  interpreter  of  its  meaning,  I  will  assert  finally, 
that,  after  having  read  for  thirty  years  in  the  same  track 
as  Coleridge,  —  that  track  in  which  few  of  any  age  will 
ever  follow  us,  such  as  German  metaphysicians,  Latin 
schoolmen,  thaumaturgic  Platonists,  religious  Mystics,  — 
and  having  thus  discovered  a  large  variety  of  trivial 
thefts,  I  do,  nevertheless,  most  heartily  believe  him  to 
have  been  as  entirely  original  in  all  his  capital  preten- 
sions, as  any  one  man  that  ever  has  existed  ;  as  Archi- 
medes in  ancient  days,  or  as  Shakspeare  in  modern.  Did 
the  reader  ever  see  Milton's  account  of  the  rubbish 
contained  in  the  Greek  and  Latin  fathers  ?  or  did  he  ever 
read  a  statement  of  the  monstrous  chaos  with  which  an 
African  Obeah  man  stufi*s  his  enchanted  scarecrows  ?  or, 
to  take  a  more  common  illustration,  did  he  ever  amuse 
himself  by  searching  the  pockets  of  a  child  —  three  years 
old,  suppose,  when  buried  in  slumber  after  a  long  sum- 
mer's day  of  out-a-door's  intense  activity  ?  I  have  done 
this  ;  and,  for  the  amusement  of  the  child's  mother,  have 
analyzed  the  contents,  and  drawn  up  a  formal  register  of 
the  whole.  Philosophy  is  puzzled,  conjecture  and  hy- 
pothesis are  confounded,  in  the  attempt  to  explain  the  law 
of  selection  which  can  have  presided  in  the  child's 
labors :  stones  remarkable  only  for  weight,  old  rusty 
hinges,  nails,  crooked  skewers,  stolen  when  the  cook  had 


164 


LITERABY  REMINISCENCES. 


turned  her  back,  rags,  broken  glass,  tea-cups  having  the 
bottom  knocked  out,  and  loads  of  similar  jewels,  were 
the  prevailing  articles  in  this  proces  verbal,  \  et,  doubt- 
less, much  labor  had  been  incurred,  some  sense  of  danger 
perhaps,  had  been  faced,  and  the  anxieties  of  a  conscious 
robber  endured,  in  order  to  amass  this  splendid  treasure. 
Such  in  value  were  the  robberies  of  Coleridge  ;  such  their 
usefulness  to  himself  or  anybody  else  ;  and  such  the  cir- 
cumstances of  uneasiness  under  which  he  had  committed 
them.    I  return  to  my  narrative. 

Two  or  three  days  had  slipped  away  in  waiting  for 
Coleridge's  re-appearance  at  Nether  Stowey,  when  sud-* 
denly  Lord  Egmont  called  upon  Mr.  Poole,  with  a  present 
for  Coleridge  ;  it  was  a  canister  of  peculiarly  fine  snuff, 
which  Coleridge  now  took  profusely.  Lord  Egmont,  on 
this  occasion,  spoke  of  Coleridge  in  the  terms  of  exces- 
sive admiration,  and  urged  Mr.  Poole  to  put  him  upon 
undertaking  some  great  monumental  work,  that  might 
furnish  a  sufficient  arena  for  the  display  of  his  various 
and  rare  accomplishments  ;  for  his  multiform  erudition 
on  the  one  hand,  for  his  splendid  power  of  theorizing  and 
combining  large  and  remote  notices  of  facts  on  the  other. 
And  he  suggested,  judiciously  enough,  as  one  theme 
which  offered  a  field  at  once  large  enough  and  indefinite 
enough  to  suit  a  mind  that  could  not  show  its  full  compass 
of  power,  unless  upon  very  plastic  materials  —  a  History 
of  Christianity,  in  its  progress  and  in  its  chief  divarica- 
tions into  Church  and  Sect,  with  a  continual  reference 
to  the  relations  subsisting  between  Christianity  and  the 
current  philosophy  ;  their  occasional  connections  or  ap- 
proaches, and  their  constant  mutual  repulsions.  '  But,  at 
liny  rate,  let  him  do  something,'  said  Lord  Egmont ;  '  for 
at  present  he  talks  very  much  like  an  angel,  and  he  does 
nothing  at  all.'    Lord  Egmont,  I  understood  from  every 


SAMUEL  TAYLOR  COLERIDGE. 


165 


body  to  be  a  truly  good  and  benevolent  man ;  and,  on 
Ihis  occasion,  he  spoke  with  an  earnestness  which  agreed 
with  my  previous  impression,  Coleridge,  he  said,  was 
now  at  the  prime  of  his  powers  —  uniting  something  of 
youthful  vigor,  with  sufficient  experience  of  life  ;  with  the 
benefit  beside  of  vast  meditation,  and  of  reading  unusually 
discursive.  No  man  had  ever  been  better  qualified  to 
revive  the  heroic  period  of  literature  in  England,  and  to 
give  a  character  of  weight  to  the  philosophic  erudition  of 
the  country  upon  the  Continent.  '  And  what  a  pity,'  he 
added,  '  if  this  man  were,  after  all,  to  vanish  like  an 
apparition  ;  and  you,  I,  and  a  few  others,  who  have  wit- 
nessed his  grand  hravuras  of  display,  were  to  have  the 
usual  fortune  of  ghost-seers,  in  meeting  no  credit  for  any 
statements  that  we  might  vouch  on  his  behalf !  ' 

To  pursue  my  narrative.  It  now  appeared  that  Lord 
Egmont's  carriage  had,  some  days  before,  conveyed 
Coleridge  to  Bridgewater,  with  a  purpose  of  staying  one 
single  day  at  that  place,  and  then  returning  to  Mr.  Poole's. 
From  the  sort  of  laugh  with  which  Lord  Egmont  taxed 
his  own  simplicity,  in  having  confided  at  all  in  the 
stability  of  any  Coleridgian  plan,  I  now  gathered  that 
procrastination  in  excess,  was,  or  had  become,  a  marked 
feature  in  Coleridge's  daily  life.  Nobody  who  knew  him 
ever  thought  of  depending  on  any  appointment  he  might 
make  ;  spite  of  his  uniformly  honorable  intentions,  nobody 
attached  any  weight  to  his  assurances  in  re  futura  :  those 
who  asked  him  to  dinner  or  any  other  party,  as  a  matter 
of  course  sent  a  carriage  for  him,  and  went  personally 
or  by  proxy  to  fetch  him ;  and,  as  to  letters,  unless  the 
address  were  in  some  female  hand  that  commanded  his 
affectionate  esteem,  he  tossed  them  all  into  one  general 
dead-letter  bureau,  and  rarely,  I  believe,  opened  them  at 
ail.   Bourrienne  mentions  a  mode  of  abridging  the  trouble 


166 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


attached  to  a  very  extensive  correspondence,  by  wMch 
infinite  labor  was  saved  to  himself  and  to  Bonaparte^ 
when  commanding  in  Italy.  Nine  out  of  ten  letters, 
supposing  them  letters  of  business  with  official  applica- 
tions of  a  special  kind,  he  contends,  answer  themselves  : 
in  other  words,  time  alone  must  soon  produce  events 
which  virtually  contain  the  answer.  On  this  principle 
the  letters  were  opened  periodically,  after  intervals,  sup- 
pose of  six  weeks  ;  and,  at  the  end  of  that  time,  it  was 
found  that  not  many  remained  to  require  any  further 
more  particular  answer.  Coleridge's  plan,  however,  was 
shorter ;  he  opened  none,  I  understood,  and  answered 
none.  At  least  such  was  his  habit  at  that  time.  But  on 
that  same  day,  all  this,  which  I  heard  now  for  the  first 
time,  and  with  much  concern,  was  fully  explained :  for 
already  he  was  under  the  full  dominion  of  opium,  as  he 
himself  revealed  to  me,  and  with  a  deep  expression  of 
horror  at  the  hideous  bondage,  in  a  private  walk  of  some 
length,  which  I  took  with  him  about  sunset. 

Lord  Egmont's  information,  and  the  knowledge  now 
gained  of  Coleridge's  habits,  making  it  very  uncertain 
when  I  might  see  him  in  my  present  hospitable  quarters, 
I  immediately  took  my  leave  of  Mr.  Poole,  and  went  over 
to  Bridgewater.  I  had  received  directions  for  finding  out 
the  house  where  Coleridge  was  visiting ;  and,  in  riding 
down  a  main  street  of  Bridgewater,  I  noticed  a  gateway 
corresponding  to  the  description  given  me.  Under  this 
was  standing,  and  gazing  about  him,  a  man  whom  I  shall 
describe.  In  height  he  might  seem  to  be  about  five  feet 
eight ;  (he  was,  in  reality,  about  an  inch  and  a  half  taller, 
but  his  figure  was  of  an  order  which  drowns  the  height ;) 
his  person  was  broad  and  full,  and  tended  even  to  cor- 
pulence ;  his  complexion  was  fair,  though  not  what  paint* 
Eis  technically  style  fair,  because  it  was  associated  with 


8A.MUEL  TAYLOR  COLERIDGE. 


167 


olack  hair ;  his  eyes  were  large  and  soft  in  their  exprea* 
Bion ;  and  it  was  from  the  peculiar  appearance  of  haze 
or  dreaminess,  which  mixed  with  their  light,  that  I  recog- 
nized my  object.  This  was  Coleridge.  I  examined  him 
steadfastly  for  a  minute  or  more ;  and  it  struck  me  that 
he  saw  neither  myself  nor  any  other  object  in  the  street. 
He  was  in  a  deep  reverie ;  for  I  had  dismounted,  made 
two  or  three  trifling  arrangements  at  an  inn  door,  and 
advanced  close  to  him,  before  he  had  apparently  become 
conscious  of  my  presence.  The  sound  of  my  voice, 
announcing  my  own  name,  first  awoke  him  :  he  started, 
and  for  a  moment  seemed  at  a  loss  to  understand  my 
purpose  or  his  own  situation ;  for  he  repeated  rapidly  a 
number  of  words  which  had  no  relation  to  either  of  us. 
There  was  no  mauvaise  honte  in  his  manner,  but  simple 
perplexity,  and  an  apparent  difficulty  in  recovering  his 
position  amongst  daylight  realities.  This  little  scene 
over,  he  received  me  with  a  kindness  of  manner  so 
marked,  that  it  might  be  called  gracious.  The  hospitable 
family  with  whom  he  was  domesticated,  were  distin- 
guished for  their  amiable  manners  and  enlightened  un- 
derstandings ;  they  were  descendants  from  Chubb,  the 
philosophic  writer,  and  bore  the  same  name.  For  Coler- 
idge, they  all  testified  deep  afiection  and  esteem  —  senti- 
ments in  which  the  whole  town  of  Bridgewater  seemed  to 
share ;  for  in  the  evening,  when  the  heat  of  the  day  had 
declined,  I  walked  out  with  him  ;  and  rarely,  perhaps 
never,  have  I  seen  a  person  so  much  interrupted  in  one 
hour's  space  as  Coleridge,  on  this  occasion,  by  the  cour- 
teous attentions  of  young  and  old. 

All  the  people  of  station  and  weight  in  the  place,  and 
apparently  all  the  ladies,  were  abroad  to  enjoy  the  lovely 
summer  evening  ;  and  not  a  party  passed  without  some 
mark  of  smiling  recognition  ;  and  the  majority  stopping 


i68 


LTTERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


t<)  msike  personal  inquiries  about  his  healtli,  and  to  express 
their  anxiety  that  he  should  make  a  lengthened  stay 
amongst  them.  Certain  I  am,  from  the  lively  esteem 
expressed  towards  Coleridge,  at  this  time,  by  the  people 
of  Bridgewater,  that  a  very  large  subscription  might  in 
that  town  have  been  raised  to  support  him  amongst  them, 
in  the  character  of  a  lecturer,  or  philosophical  professor. 
Especially,  I  remarked,  that  the  young  men  of  the  place 
jaaniCested  the  most  liberal  interest  in  all  that  concerned 
him ;  and  I  can  add  my  attestation  to  that  of  Mr.  Coler- 
idge himself,  when  describing  an  evening  spent  amongst 
the  enlightened  tradesmen  of  Birmingham,  that  nowhere 
is  more  unaffected  good  sense  exhibited,  and  particularly 
nowhere  more  elasticity  and  freshness  of  mind,  than  in 
the  conversation  of  the  reading  men  in  manufacturing 
towns.  In  Kendal,  especially,  in  Bridgewater,  and  in 
Manchester,  I  have  witnessed  more  interesting  conversa- 
tions, as  much  information,  and  more  natural  eloquence 
in  conveying  it  than  usually  in  literary  cities,  or  in  places 
professedly  learned.  One  reason  for  this  is,  that  in 
trading  towns  the  time  is  more  happily  distributed  ;  the 
day  given  to  business,  and  active  duties  —  the  evening  to 
relaxation  ;  on  which  account,  books,  conversation,  and 
literary  leisure  are  more  cordially  enjoyed :  the  same 
satiation  never  can  take  place,  which  too  frequently 
deadens  the  genial  enjoyment  of  those  who  have  a  sur- 
feit of  books,  and  a  monotony  of  leisure.  iVnother 
reason  is,  that  more  simplicity  of  manner  may  be  ex- 
pected, and  a  more  natural  picturesqueness  of  conversa- 
tion, more  open  expression  of  character  in  places,  where 
people  have  no  previous  name  to  support  Men,  in 
trading  towns,  are  not  afraid  to  open  their  lips,  for  fear  they 
should  disappoint  your  expectations,  nor  do  they  strain 
for  showy  sentiments,  that  they  may  meet  them.  Bu^ 


SAMUEL  TAYIOR  COLERIDGE. 


169 


^Blse^\here,  many  are  the  men  who  stand  in  awe  of  their 
own  reputation :  not  a  word  which  is  unstudied,  not  a 
movement  in  the  spirit  of  natural  freedom,  dare  they  give 
way  to  ;  because  it  might  happen  that  on  review  some* 
thing  would  be  seen  to  retract  or  to  qualify  —  something 
not  properly  planned  and  chiselled,  to  build  into  the 
general  architecture  of  an  artificial  reputation.  But  to 
teturn  :  — 

Coleridge  led  me  to  a  drawing-room,  rang  the  bell  for 
refreshments,  and  omitted  no  point  of  a  courteous  recep- 
tion. He  told  me  that  there  would  be  a  very  large  dinner 
party  on  that  day,  which,  perhaps,  might  be  disagreeable 
to  a  perfect  stranger  ;  but,  if  not,  he  could  assure  me  of 
a  most  hospitable  welcome  from  the  family.  I  was  too 
anxious  to  see  him  under  all  aspects,  to  think  of  declining 
this  invitation.  And  these  little  points  of  business  being 
settled  —  Coleridge,  like  some  great  river,  the  Orellana, 
or  the  St.  Lawrence,  that  had  been  checked  and  fretted 
by  rocks  or  thwarting  islands,  and  suddenly  recovers  its 
volume  of  waters,  and  its  mighty  music  —  swept  at  once, 
as  if  returning  to  his  natural  business,  into  a  continuous 
strain  of  eloquent  dissertation,  certainly  the  most  novel, 
the  most  finely  illustrated,  and  traversing  the  most  spa- 
cious fields  of  thought,  by  transitions  the  most  just  and 
logical,  that  it  was  possible  to  conceive.  What  I  mean 
by  saying  that  his  transitions  were  'just,*  is  by  way  of 
contradistinction  to  that  mode  of  conversation  which  courts 
variety  by  means  of  verbal  connections.  Coleridge,  to 
many  people,  and  often  I  have  heard  the  complaint, 
seemed  to  wander  ;  and  he  seemed  then  to  wander  the 
most,  when  in  fact  his  resistance  to  the  wandering  instinct 
was  greatest,  —  viz.  when  the  compass,  and  huge  circuit, 
by  which  his  illustrations  moved,  travelled  farthest  into 
remote  regions,  before  they  began  to   revolve.  Long 


170 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


before  this  coming-round  commenced,  most  people  had 
lost  him,  and  naturally  enough  supposed  that  he  had  lost 
himself.  They  continued  to  admire  the  separate  heauty 
of  the  thoughts,  but  did  not  see  their  relations  to  the 
dominant  theme.  Had  the  conversation  been  thrown  upon 
paper,  it  might  have  been  easy  to  trace  the  continuity 
of  the  links  :  just  as  in  Bishop  Berkeley's  Siris,*  from  a 
pedestal  so  low  and  abject,  so  culinary,  as  Tar  Water,  the 
method  of  preparing  it,  and  its  medicinal  effects,  the 
dissertation  ascends,  like  Jacob's  ladder,  by  just  grada- 
tions, into  the  Heaven  of  Heavens,  and  the  thrones  of  the 
Trinity,  But  Heaven  is  there  connected  with  earth  by 
the  Homeric  chain  of  gold  ;  and  being  subject  to  steady 
examination,  it  is  easy  to  trace  the  links.  Whereas,  in 
conversation,  the  loss  of  a  single  word  may  cause  the 
whole  cohesion  to  disappear  from  view.  However,  I  can 
assert,  upon  my  long  and  intimate  knowledge  of  Coler- 
idge's mind,  that  logic,  the  most  severe,  w^as  as  inalien- 
able from  his  modes  of  thinking,  as  grammar  from  his 
language. 

On  the  present  occasion,  the  original  theme,  started 
by  myself,  was  Hartley,  and  the  Hartleian  theory.  I  had 
carried,  as  a  little  present  to  Coleridge,  a  scarce  Latin 
pamphlet,  De  Ideis,  written  by  Hartley,  about  1746,  that 
is,  about  three  years  earlier  than  the  publication  of  his 
great  work.  He  had  also  preluded  to  this  great  work,  in 
a  little  English  medical  tract  upon  Joanna  Stephens's 
medicine  for  the  stone  ;  for  indeed  Hartley  was  the  person 
upon  whose  evidence  the  House  of  Commons  had  mainly 
relied  in  giving  to  that  same  Joanna  a  reward  of  £5000 
for  her  idle  medicines  —  an  application  of  public  money 

♦  Sciris  ought  to  have  been  the  title,  i,  e.  Sfigig,  a  chain;  from  this 
defect  in  the  orthography,  I  did  not  in  my  boyish  days  perceive,  nor 
fould  obtain  any  light  upon  its  meaning. 


SAMUEL  TAYLOB  COLERIDGE. 


171 


not  without  its  use,  in  so  far  as  it  engaged  men  by  selfish 
motives  to  cultivate  the  public  service,  and  to  attempt  pub- 
lic problems  of  very  difficult  solution  ;  but  else,  in  that 
particular  instance,  perfectly  idle,  as  the  groans  of  three 
generations  since  Joanna's  era  have  too  feelingly  estab- 
lished. It  is  known  to  most  literary  people  that  Coleridge 
was,  in  early  life,  so  passionate  an  admirer  of  the  Hart- 
leian  philosophy,  that  '  Hartley  '  was  the  sole  baptismal 
name  which  he  gave  to  his  eldest  child ;  and  in  an  early 
poem,  entitled  *  Religious  Musings/  he  has  characterized 
Hartley  as  — 

 •  Him, 

Wisest  of  men,  -^^ho  saw  the  mimic  trains 
Pass  in  fine  surges  to  the  sentient  brain.' 

But  at  present,  (August,  1807,)  all  this  was  a  forgotten 
thing.  Coleridge  was  so  profoundly  ashamed  of  the 
shallow  Unitarianisra  of  Hartley,  and  so  disgusted  to 
think  that  he  could  at  any  time  have  countenanced  that 
creed,  that  he  would  scarcely  allow  to  Hartley  the  rever- 
ence which  is  undoubtedly  his  due :  for  I  must  contend 
that,  waiving  all  question  of  the  extent  to  which  Hartley 
would  have  pushed  it,  (as  though  the  law  of  association 
accounted  not  only  for  our  complex  pleasures  and  pains, 
but  also  might  be  made  to  explain  the  act  of  ratiocination,) 
waiving  also  the  physical  substratum  of  nervous  vibrations 
and  miniature  vibrations,  to  which  he  has  chosen  to  marry 
his  theory  of  association  :  —  all  this  apart,  I  must  contend 
that  the  *  Essay  on  Man,  his  Frame,  his  Duty,  and  his 
.Expectations,'  stands  forward  as  a  specimen  almost  unique 
of  elaborate  theorizing,  and  a  monument  of  absolute 
beauty,  in  the  perfection  of  its  dialectic  ability.  In  this 
respect  it  has,  to  my  mind,  the  spotless  beauty,  and  the 
'deal  proportions  of  some  Grecian  statue.     However,  1 


72  tlTEEABY  REMINISCENCES. 

confess,  that  being  myself,  from  my  earliest  years,  a 
reverential  believer  in  the  doctrine  of  the  Trinity,  simply 
because  I  never  attempted  to  bring  all  things  within  the 
mechanic  understanding,  and  because,  like  Sir  Thomas 
Browne,  my  mind  almost  demanded  mysteries,  in  so  mys- 
terious a  system  of  relations  as  those  which  connect  ua 
with  another  world,  and  also  because  the  farther  my 
understanding  opened,  the  more  I  perceived  of  dim  anal* 
ogies  to  strengthen  my  creed ;  and  because  nature  herself, 
mere  physical  nature,  has  mysteries  no  less  profound ; 
and  because  the  simplest  doctrine  of  motion  rests  upon  ati 
ultimate  fact,  which  all  the  wisdom  of  the  schools  will' 
never  explain ;  and  because  that  vulgar  puzzle  of  Achilles 
and  the  Tortoise  never  was  and  never  will  be  cleared 
up  ;  and,  finally,  because  I  had  begun  to  suspect  (what 
afterwards  Coleridge  more  fully  convinced  me  of)  that 
the  unity  demanded  by  the  soi-disant  Unitarian  is  a  chi- 
mera and  a  total  blunder,  —  being,  in  fact,  not  unity,  but 
what  the  schoolmen  call  unicity ;  for,  as  they  insist, 
without  previous  multitude  (meaning  by  multitude  simply 

*  So  cleared  up,  1  mean,  as  to  make  it  other  than  a  mystery. 
Else,  in  a  sense  which,  leaving  a  great  mystery  behind,  clears  it  of 
<5ontradiction,  it  was  solved  satisfactorily  to  my  mind  by  Mr.  Coler- 
idge —  I  believe  in  print ;  but  at  any  rate  in  conversation.  I  had 
remarked  to  him  that  the  *  sophism,'  as  it  is  usually  called,  but  the 
difficulty  as  it  should  be  called,  of  Achilles  and  the  Tortoise,  which 
had  puzzled  all  the  sages  of  Greece,  was,  in  fact,  merely  another 
form  of  the  perplexity  which  besets  decimal  fractions  —  that,  for 
example,  if  you  throw  f  into  a  decimfil  form,  it  will  never  terminate, 
but  be  .666666,  &c.,  ad  infinitum.  *  Yes,'  Coleridge  replied  :  *  the 
apparent  absurdity  in  the  Grecian  problem  arises  thus  —  because 
it  assumes  the  infinite  divisibility  of  space,  but  drops  out  of  view  the 
eorresponding  infinity  of  time,^  There  was  a  flash  of  lightning, 
which  illuminated  a  darkness  that  had  existed  for  tW6nty-three  cei]^ 
turies ! 


SAMUEL  TAYLOR  COLERIDQE.  JTS^ 

plurality)  there  can  be  no  proper  unity ;  for,  else,  where 
Is  the  union  —  ^^  here  is  the  To  unitum  ? 

For  these  and  for  many  other  *  hecauses^^  I  could  not 
reconcile,  with  my  general  reverence  for  Mr.  Coleridge, 
the  fact  so  often  reported  to  me,  that  he  was  a  Unitarian. 
A  Unitarian,  I  often  exclaimed,  and  a  philosopher  !  Nay, 
it  cannot  be  denied,  the  profoundest  of  philosophers !  and 
one  destined  to  sound  the  intellectual  depths,  and  the 
depths  below  depths,  beyond  any  other  of  the  children  of 
men.  But,  said  some  Bristol  people  to  me,  not  only  is 
he  a  Unitarian  —  he  is  also  a  Socinian.  In  that  case,  I 
replied,  I  cannot  hold  him  a  Christian.  I  am  a  liberal 
man,  and  have  no  bigotry  or  hostile  feelings  towards  a 
Socinian;  but  I  can  never  think  that  man  a  Christian, 
who  has  blotted  out  of  his  scheme  the  very  powers  by 
which  only  the  great  offices  and  functions  of  Christianity 
can  be  sustained ;  neither  can  I  think  that  any  man, 
though  he  may  make  himself  a  marvellously  clever  dis- 
putant, ever  could  tower  upwards  into  a  very  great 
philosopher,  unless  he  should  begin  or  should  end  with 
Christianity.  Kant  is  a  dubious  exception.  Not  that  I 
mean  to  question  his  august  pretensions,  so  far  as  they 
went,  and  in  his  proper  line.  Within  his  own  circle  none 
durst  tread  but  he.  But  that  circle  was  limited.  He  was 
called,  by  one  who  weighed  him  well,  the  alles-zermah 
mender^  the  world-shattering  Kant.  He  could  destroy  — 
.lis  intellect  was  essentially  destructive.  He  was  the  Gog 
and  he  was  the  Magog  of  Hunnish  desolation  to  the 
existing  schemes  of  philosophy.  He  probed  them ;  he 
showed  the  vanity  of  vanities  which  besieged  their  foun- 
dations,—  the  rottenness  below,  the  hollowness  above. 
But  he  had  no  instincts  of  creation  or  restoration  within 
his  Apollyon  mind;  for  he  had  no  love,  no  faith,  no 
>eK-distrust,  no  humility,  no  childlike  docility ;  all  which 


174 


LITERAKl  REMINISCENCES. 


ijualities  belonged  essentially  to  Coleridge's  mind,  and 
waited  only  for  manhood  and  for  sorrow  to  bring  them 
forward. 

Who  can  read  without  indignation  of  Kant,  that,  at  his 
own  table,  in  social  sincerity  and  confidential  talk,  let  him 
say  what  he  would  in  his  books,  he  exulted  in  the  prospect 
of  absolute  and  ultimate  annihilation ;  that  he  planted 
his  glory  in  the  grave,  and  was  ambitious  of  rotting  for 
ever !  The  King  of  Prussia,  though  a  personal  friend  of 
Kant's,  found  himself  obliged  to  level  his  state  thunders 
at  some  of  his  doctrines,  and  terrified  him  in  his  advance ; 
else,  I  am  persuaded  that  Kant  would  have  formally  de- 
livered Atheism  from  the  Professor's  chair,  and  would 
have  enthroned  ihe  horrid  Ghoulish  creed,  which  privately 
he  professed,  in  the  University  of  Konigsberg.  It  re- 
(^uired  the  artillery  of  a  great  King  to  make  him  pause. 
The  fact  is,  that  as  the  stomach  has  been  known,  by 
means  of  its  natural  secretion,  to  attack  not  only  whatso- 
ever alien  body  is  introduced  within  it,  but  also  (as  John 
Hunter  first  showed)  sometimes  to  attack  itself  and  its 
own  organic  structure;  so,  and  with  the  same  preter- 
natural extension  of  instinct,  did  Kant  carry  forward  his 
destroying  functions,  until  he  turned  them  upon  his  own 
hopes  and  the  pledges  of  his  own  superiority  to  the  dog  — 
the  ape  —  the  worm.  But  '  exoriare  aliquis,^  —  and  some 
philosopher,  I  am  persuaded,  will  yet  arise;  and  *  one 
sling  of  some  victorious  arm'  (Paradise  Lost,  b.  X.)  will 
yet  destroy  the  destroyer,  in  so  far  as  he  has  applied 
himself  to  the  destruction  of  Christian  hope.  For  my 
faith  is,  that,  though  a  great  man  may,  by  a  rare  possi- 
bility, be  an  infidel,  an  intellect  of  the  highest  order  must 
build  upon  Christianity.  A  very  clever  architect  may 
choose  to  show  his  power  by  building  with  sufficient 
materials,  but  the  supreme  architect  must  require  the 


SAMUEL  TAYLOB  COLEBIDOE. 


175 


vf ry  best ;  because  the  perfection  of  the  forms  cannot  be 
shown  but  in  the  perfection  of  the  matter. 

On  these  accounts  T  took  the  liberty  of  doubting,  as 
often  as  I  heard  the  reports  I  have  mentioned  of  Coleridge  ; 
and  I  now  found  that  he  disowned  most  solemnly  (and  I 
may  say  penitentially)  whatever  had  been  true  in  these 
reports.  Coleridge  told  me  that  it  had  cost  him  a  painful 
effort,  but  not  a  moment's  hesitation,  to  abjure  his  Unita- 
rianism,  from  the  circumstance  that  he  had  amongst  the 
Unitarians  many  friends,  to  some  of  whom  he  was  greatly 
indebted  for  kind  offices.  In  particular  he  mentioned  Mr. 
Estlin  of  Bristol,  I  })elieve  a  dissenting  clergyman,  as  one 
whom  it  grieved  him  to  grieve.  But  he  would  not  dissem- 
ble his  altered  views.  I  will  add,  at  the  risk  of  appearing 
to  dwell  too  long  on  religious  topics,  that  on  this  my  first 
introduction  to  Coleridge,  he  reverted  with  strong  com- 
punction to  a  sentiment  which  he  had  expressed  in  earlier 
days,  upon  prayer.  In  one  of  his  youthful  poems,  speak- 
ing of  God,  he  had  said,  — 

— —  •  Of  whose  all-seeing  eye 
Aught  to  demand  were  impotence  of  mind.* 

This  sentiment  he  now  so  utterly  condemned,  that,  on  the 
contrary,  he  told  me,  as  his  own  peculiar  opinion,  that  the 
act  of  praying  was  the  very  highest  energy  of  which  the 
human  heart  was  capable ;  praying,  that  is,  with  the  total 
concentration  of  the  faculties;  and  the  great  mass  of 
worldly  men  and  of  learned  men,  he  pronounced  abso- 
lutely incapable  of  prayer.  / 

For  about  three  hours  he  had  continued  to  talk,  and  in 
the  course  of  this  performance  he  had  delivered  many  most 
striking  aphorisms,  embalming  more  weight  of  truth,  and 
separately  more  deserving  to  be  themselves  embalmed 
than  any  that  arp  on  record.    In  the  midst  of  our  con- 


176 


lilTERARY  EEMINISCENCES. 


versation,  if  that  can  be  called  conversation  which  I 
BO  seldom  sought  to  interrupt,  and  which  did  not  often 
leave  openings  for  contribution,  the  door  opened,  and 
a  lady  entered.  She  was  in  person  full  and  rather 
below  the  common  height :  whilst  her  face  showed,  to  my 
eye,  some  prettiness  of  rather  a  commonplace  order. 
Coleridge  turned,  upon  her  entrance :  his  features,  how- 
ever, announced  no  particular  complacency,  and  did  not 
relax  into  a  smile.  In  a  frigid  tone  he  said,  whilst  turning 
to  me,  '  Mrs.  Coleridge :  '  in  some  slight  way  he  then 
presented  me  to  her :  I  bowed ;  and  the  lady  almost  im- 
mediately retired.  From  this  short,  but  ungenial  scene, 
I  gathered,  what  I  afterward  learned  redundantly,  that 
Coleridge's  marriage  had  not  been  a  very  happy  one. 
But  let  not  the  reader  misunderstand  me.  Never  was 
there  a  baser  insinuation,  viler  in  the  motive,  or  more 
ignoble  in  the  manner,  than  that  passage  in  some  lampoon 
of  Lord  Byron's,  where,  by  way  of  vengeance  on  Mr. 
Southey,  (who  was  the  sole  delinquent,)  he  described 
both  him  and  Coleridge  as  having  married  '  two  milliners 
from  Bath.'  Everybody  knows  what  is  meant  to  be  con- 
veyed in  that  expression,  though  it  would  be  hard  indeed, 
if,  even  at  Bath,  there  should  be  any  class  under  such  a 
fatal  curse,  condemned  so  irretrievably,  and  so  hopelessly 
prejudged — that  ignominy  must,  at  any  rate,  attach,  in 
virtue  of  a  mere  name  or  designation,  to  the  mode  by 
which  they  gained  their  daily  bread,  or  possibly  supported 
the  declining  years  of  a  parent.  However,  in  this  case, 
the  whole  sting  of  the  libel  was  a  pure  falsehood  of  Lord 
Byron's.  Bath  was  not  the  native  city,  nor  at  any  time 
the  residence  of  the  ladies  in  question,  but  Bristol.  As  to 
the  other  word,  '  milliners,^  that  is  not  worth  inquiring 
%bout.  Whether  they,  or  any  one  of  their  family,  ever 
did  exercise  this  profession,  I  do  not  kn  ow :  they  were  at 


SAMUEL  TAYLOR  COLEKIDGE.  177 

nil  events  too  young,  when  removed  by  marriage  from 
Bristol,  to  have  been  much  tainted  by  the  worldly  feelings 
which  may  beset  sucL  a  mode  of  life.  But  what  is  more 
to  the  purpose,  I  heard  at  this  time  in  Bristol,  from  Mr. 
Cottle  the  author,  a  man  of  high  principle,  from  hia 
accomplished  sisters,  from  the  ladies  who  had  succeeded 
Mrs.  Hannah  More  in  her  school,  and  who  enjoyed  her 
entire  confidence,  as  well  as  from  other  most  respectable 
residents  at  Bristol,  who  had  passed  their  lives  in  that 
city,  that  the  whole  family  of  four  or  five  sisters  haa 
maintained  an  irreproachable  character,  though  naturally 
exposed  by  their  personal  attractions  to  some  peril,  and 
to  the  malevolence  of  envy.  This  declaration,  which  I 
could  strengthen  by  other  testimony  equally  disinter^ 
ested,  if  it  were  at  all  necessary,  I  owe  to  truth  ;  and  I 
must  also  add,  upon  a  knowledge  more  personal,  that 
Mrs.  Coleridge  was,  in  all  circumstances  of  her  married 
life,  a  virtuous  wife,  and  a  conscientious  mother  ;  and  as 
a  mother,  she  showed  at  times  a  most  meritorious  energy : 
in  particular,  I  remember  that,  wishing  her  daughter  to 
acquire  the  Italian  language,  and  having,  in  her  retirement 
at  Keswick,  no  means  of  obtaining  a  master,  she  set  to 
work  resolutely  under  Mr.  Southey's  guidance,  to  learn 
the  language  herself  at  a  time  of  life  when  such  attain- 
ments are  not  made  with  ease  or  pleasure  :  she  became 
mistress  of  the  language  in  a  very  respectable  extent 
und  then  communicated  her  new  accomplishment  to  hei 
fnteresting  daughter. 

Meantime,  I,  for  my  part,  owe  Mrs.  Coleridge  no  par 
ticular  civility  :  and  I  see  no  reason  why  I  should  mystify 
the  account  of  Coleridge's  life  or  habits,  by  dissembling 
what  is  notorious  to  so  many  thousands  of  people.  An 
insult  once  offered  by  Mrs.  Coleridge  to  a  female  relative 
of  my  own,  as  much  superior  to  Mrs.  Coleridge  in  th^ 
12 


178 


LITEKARY  REMINISCENCES. 


spirit  of  courtesy  and  kindness,  which  ought  to  preside  in 
the  intercourse  between  females,  as  she  was  in  the  splen- 
dor of  her  beauty,  would  have  given  me  a  dispensation 
from  all  terms  of  consideration  beyond  the  restraints  oi 
Btrict  justice.  My  offence  was  —  the  having  procrasti- 
nated in  some  trifling  affair  of  returning  a  volume,  or  a 
MS. ;  and  during  my  absence  at  a  distance  of  four  or  five 
hundred  miles,  Mrs.  Coleridge  thought  fit  to  write  a  letter, 
filled  with  the  most  intemperate  expressions  of  anger, 
addressed  to  one  whom  she  did  not  know  by  sight,  and 
who  could  in  no  way  be  answerable  for  my  delinquencies. 
I  go  on,  therefore,  to  say,  that  Coleridge  afterwards  made 
me,  as  doubtless  some  others,  a  confidant  in  this  particu- 
lar. What  he  had  to  complain  of,  was  simply  incompati- 
bility of  temper  and  disposition.  Wanting  all  cordial 
admiration,  or  indeed  comprehension  of  her  husband's 
intellectual  powers,  Mrs.  Coleridge  wanted  the  original 
basis  for  aftectionate  patience  and  candor.  Hearing  from 
everybody  that  Coleridge  was  a  man  of  most  extraordinary 
endowments,  and  attaching  little  weight,  perhaps,  to  the 
distinction  between  popular  talents,  and  such  as  by  their 
very  nature  are  doomed  to  a  slower  progress  in  the  public 
esteem,  she  naturally  looked  to  see  at  least  an  ordinary 
measure  of  worldly  consequence  attend  upon  their  exer- 
cise. 

Now  had  poor  Coleridge  been  as  persevering  and  punc- 
tual as  the  great  mass  of  professional  men,  and  had  he 
given  no  reason  to  throw  the  onus  of  the  different  result 
upon  his  own  different  habits,  —  in  that  case  this  result 
might,  possibly  and  eventually,  have  been  set  down  to 
the  peculiar  constitution  of  his  powers,  and  their  essential 
non-popularity  in  the  English  market.  But  this  trial  hav- 
ing never  fairly  been  made,  it  was  natural  to  impute  his 
aon-success  exclusively  to  his  own  irregular  application, 


SAMUEIi  TArLOB  COLERIDGE. 


179 


and  his  carelessness  in  forming  judicious  connections.  In 
circumstances  such  as  these,  however,  no  matter  how 
caused,  or  how  palliated,  was  laid  a  sure  ground  of  dis- 
content and  fretfulness  in  any  woman's  mind,  not  un- 
usually indulgent,  or  unusually  magnanimous.  Coleridge, 
besides,  assured  me  that  his  marriage  was  not  his  own 
deliberate  act ;  but  was  in  a  manner  forced  upon  his  sense 
of  honor,  by  the  scrupulous  Southey,  who  insisted  that  he 
had  gone  too  far  in  his  attentions  to  Miss  Fricker,  for  any 
honorable  retreat.  On  the  other  hand,  a  neutral  spectator 
of  the  parties  protested  to  me,  that  if  ever  in  his  life  he 
had  seen  a  man  under  deep  fascination,  and  what  he 
would  have  called  desperately  in  love.  Coleridge,  in  rela- 
tion to  IVIiss  Fricker,  was  that  man.  Be  that  as  it  might, 
circumstances  occurred  soon  after  the  marriage,  which 
placed  all  the  parties  in  a  trying  situation  for  ther  candor 
and  good  temper.  I  had  a  full  outline  of  the  situation 
from  two  of  those  who  were  chiefly  interested,  and  a 
partial  one  from  a  third  :  nor  can  it  be  denied  that  all  the 
parties  offended  in  point  of  prudence.  A  young  lady 
became  a  neighbor,  and  a  daily  companion  of  Coleridge's 
walks,  whom  I  will  not  describe  more  particularly,  than 
by  saying  that  intellectually  she  was  very  much  superior 
to  Mrs.  Coleridge.  That  superiority  alone,  when  made 
conspicuous  by  its  effect  in  winning  Coleridge's  regard 
and  society,  could  not  but  be  deeply  mortifying  to  a  young 
wife.  However,  it  was  moderated  to  her  feelings  by  two 
considerations,  —  1st,  That  the  young  lady  was  much  too 
kind-hearted  to  have  designed  any  annoyance  in  this  tri- 
umph, or  to  express  any  exultation ;  2d,  That  no  shadow 
of  suspicion  settled  upon  the  moral  conduct  or  motives 
^f  either  party  :  the  young  lady  was  always  attended  by 
her  brother  :  she  had  n<?  personal  charms  ;  and  it  was 
Wnifest  that  mere  intellectual  sympathies,  in  reference 


180 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


to  literature  and  natural  scenery,  had  associated  them  in 
their  daily  walks. 

Still  it  is  a  bitter  trial  to  a  ,young  married  woman  to 
sustain  any  sort  of  competition  with  a  female  of  her  own 
age,  for  any  part  of  her  husband's  regard,  or  any  share  of 
his  company.  Mrs.  Coleridge,  not  having  the  same  relish 
for  long  walks  or  rural  scenery,  and  their  residence  being, 
at  this  time,  in  a  very  sequestered  village,  was  condemned 
to  a  daily  renewal  of  this  trial.  Accidents  of  another 
kind  embittered  it  still  further  :  often  it  would  happen 
that  the  walking  party  returned  drenched  with  rain  ;  in 
which  case  the  young  lady,  with  a  laughing  gayety,  and 
evidently  unconscious  of  any  liberty  that  she  was  taking, 
or  any  wound  that  she  was  inflicting,  would  run  up  to 
Mrs.  Coleridge's  wardrobe,  array  herself,  without  leave 
asked,  in  Mrs.  Coleridge's  dresses,  and  make  herself 
merry  with  her  own  uncerimoniousness  and  Mrs.  Cole-? 
ridge's  gravity.  In  all  this,  she  took  no  liberty  that  she 
would  not  most  readily  have  granted  in  return ;  she 
confided  too  unthinkingly  in  what  she  regarded  as  the 
natural  privileges  of  friendship  ;  and  as  little  thought  that 
she  had  been  receiving  or  exacting  a  favor,  as,  under 
an  exchange  of  their  relative  positions,  she  would  have 
claimed  to  have  conferred  one.  But  Mrs.  Coleridge 
viewed  her  freedoms  with  a  far  difi*erent  eye  :  she  felt 
herself  no  longer  the  entire  mistress  of  her  own  house ; 
she  held  a  divided  empire ;  and  it  barbed  the  arrow  to 
her-  womanly  feelings,  that  Coleridge  treated  any  sallies 
of  resentment  which  might  sometimes  escape  her,  as 
narrow-mindedness  :  whilst,  on  the  other  hand,  her  own 
female  servant,  and  others,  in  the  same  rank  of  life,  began 
to  drop  expressions,  which  alternately  implied  pity  for  her 
as  an  injured  woman,  or  sneered  at  her  as  a  very  tame 
Que. 


8AMFEI,  TAYLOR  COLEEIDGE. 


19. 


The  reader  will  easily  apprehend  the  situation,  ajid 
the  unfortunate  results  which  it  boded  to  the  harmony 
of  a  young  married  couple,  without  further  illustration. 
Whether  Coleridge  would  not,  under  any  circumstances, 
have  become  indifferent  to  a  wife  not  eminently  capable 
of  enlightened  sympathy  with  his  own  ruling  pursuits,  I 
shall  not  undertake  to  guess.  But  doubtless  this  consum- 
mation must  have  been  hastened  by  a  situation  which 
exposed  Mrs.  Coleridge  to  an  invidious  comparison  with 
a  more  intellectual  person ;  as,  on  the  other  hand,  it  was 
most  unfortunate  for  Coleridge  himself,  to  be  continually 
compared  with  one  so  ideally  correct  and  regular  in  his 
business  habits  as  Mr.  Southey.  Thus  was  their  domestic 
peace  prematurely  soured  :  embarrassments  of  a  pecuniary 
nature  would  be  likely  to  demand  continual  sacrifices  ;  no 
depth  of  affection  existing,  these  would  create  disgust  or 
dissension ;  and  at  length,  each  would  believe  that  their 
union  had  originated  in  circumstances  overruling  their 
own  deliberate  choice. 

The  gloom,  however,  and  the  weight  of  dejection  which 
gat  upon  Coleridge's  countenance  and  deportment  at  this 
time,  could  not  be  accounted  for  by  a  disappointment, 
(if  such  it  were,)  to  which  time  must,  long  ago,  have 
reconciled  him.  Mrs.  Coleridge,  if  not  turning  to  him 
the  more  amiable  aspects  of  her  character,  was,  at  any 
rate,  a  respectable  partner.  And  the  season  of  youth  was 
now  passed.  They  had  been  married  about  ten  years  ; 
had  had  four  children,  of  whom  three  survived  ;  and  the 
interests  of  a  father  were  now  replacing  those  of  a  hus- 
band. Yet  never  had  I  beheld  so  profound  an  expression 
of  cheerless  despondency.  And  the  restless  activity  of 
Coleridge's  mind  in  chasing  abstract  truths,  and  burying 
Wmself  in  the  dark  places  of  human  speculation,  seemed 
vo  me,  in  a  great  measure,  an  attempt  to  escape  out  of  his 


182 


LITEKARY  KEMINISCENCES. 


own  personal  wretchedness.  At  dinner,  when  a  very 
numerous  party  had  assembled,  he  knew  that  he  was 
expected  to  talk,  and  exerted  himself  to  meet  the  expec- 
tation. But  he  was  evidently  struggling  with  gloomy 
thoughts  that  prompted  him  to  silence,  and  perhaps  to 
solitude  :  he  talked  with  effort ;  and  passively  resigned 
himself  to  the  repeated  misrepresentations  of  several 
amongst  his  hearers.  It  must  be  to  this  period  of  Coler- 
idge's life  that  Wordsworth  refers  in  those  exquisite 
*  Lines  written  in  my  pocket-copy  of  the  Castle  of  In- 
dolence.' The  passage  which  I  mean  comes  after  a 
description  of  Coleridge's  countenance,  and  begins  in 
some  such  terms  as  these :  — 

•  A  piteous  sight  it  was  to  see  this  man. 
When  he  came  back  to  us,  a  withered  flow  r,'  &c. 

Withered  he  was  indeed,  and  to  all  appearance  blighted. 
At  night  he  entered  into  a  spontaneous  explanation  of 
this  unhappy  overclouding  of  his  life,  on  occasion  of  my 
saying  accidentally  that  a  tooth-ache  had  obliged  me  to 
take  a  few  drops  of  laudanum.  At  what  time  or  on  what 
motive  he  had  commenced  the  use  of  opium,  he  did  not 
Bay ;  but  the  peculiar  emphasis  of  horror  with  which  he 
warned  me  against  forming  a  habit  of  the  same  kind, 
impressed  upon  my  mind  a  feeling  that  he  never  hoped 
to  liberate  himself  from  the  bondage.  About  ten  o'clock 
at  night  I  took  leave  of  him  ;  and  feeling  that  I  could  not 
easily  go  to  sleep  after  the  excitement  of  the  day,  and 
fresh  from  the  sad  spectacle  of  powers  so  majestic 
already  besieged  by  decay,  I  determined  to  return  to 
Bristol  through  the  coolness  of  the  night.  The  roads, 
though,  in  fact,  a  section  of  the  great  highway  between 
Beaports  so  turbulent  as  Bristol  and  Plymouth,  were  as 
quiet  as  garden-walks.  Once  only  I  passed  through  the 
expiring  fires  of  a  village  fair  or  wake  :  that  interruption 


SAMUEL  TAYLOB  COLERIDGE. 


183 


excepted,  through  the  whole  stretch  of  forty  miles  from 
Bridge  water  to  the  Hot- wells,  I  saw  no  living  creature, 
but  a  surly  dog,  who  followed  me  for  a  mile  along  a  park 
wall,  and  a  man  who  was  moving  about  in  the  half-way 
town  of  Cross.  The  turnpike  gates  were  all  opened  by 
a  mechanical  contrivance  from  a  bed-room  wandow ;  I 
seemed  to  myself  in  solitary  possession  of  the  whole 
sleeping  country  :  —  the  summer  night  was  divinely  calm ; 
no  sound,  except  once  or  twice  the  cry  of  a  child  as  I 
was  passing  the  windows  of  cottages,  ever  broke  upon 
the  utter  silence  ;  and  all  things  conspired  to  throw  back 
my  thoughts  upon  the  extraordinary  person  whom  I  had 
quitted. 

The  fine  saying  of  Addison  is  familiar  to  most  readers, 
—  that  Babylon  in  ruins  is  not  so  affecting  a  spectacle,  or 
so  solemn,  as  a  human  mind  overthrown  by  lunacy. 
How  much  more  awful,  then,  and  more  magnificent  a 
wreck,  when  a  mind  so  regal  as  that  of  Coleridge  is 
overthrown  or  threatened  with  overthrow,  not  by  a  visita- 
tion of  Providence,  but  by  the  treachery  of  his  own  will, 
and  the  conspiracy  as  it  were  of  himself  against  himself! 
Was  it  possible  that  this  ruin  had  been  caused  or  hurried 
forward  by  the  dismal  degradations  of  pecuniary  difificul- 
ties  ?  That  was  worth  inquiring.  I  will  here  mention 
briefiy  that  I  did  inquire  two  days  after ;  and  in  conse- 
quence of  what  I  heard,  I  contrived  that  a  particular 
service  should  be  tendered  to  Mr.  Coleridge,  a  week 
after,  through  the  hands  of  Mr.  Cottle  of  Bristol,  which 
might  have  the  effect  of  liberating  his  mind  from  anxiety 
for  a  year  or  two,  and  thus  rendering  his  great  powers 
disposable  to  their  natural  uses.  That  service  was 
accepted  by  Coleridge.  To  save  him  any  feelings  of 
distress,  all  names  were  concealed  ;  but  in  a  letter  written 
by  him,  about  fifteen  years  after  this  time,  I  found  that 


184 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


he  had  become  aware  of  all  the  circumstances,  perhaps 
through  some  indiscretion  of  Mr.  Cottle's.  A  more  im- 
portant question  I  never  ascertained  —  viz.  whether  this 
service  had  the  effect  of  seriously  lightening  his  mind. 
For  some  succeeding  years  he  did  certainly  appear  to  me 
released  from  that  load  of  despondency  which  oppressed 
him  on  my  first  introduction.  Grave,  indeed,  he  con- 
tinued to  be,  and  at  times  absorbed  in  gloom ;  nor 
did  I  ever  see  him  in  a  state  of  perfectly  natural 
cheerfulness.  But  as  he  strove  in  vain,  for  many  years, 
to  wean  himself  from  his  captivity  to  opium,  a  healthy 
state  of  spirits  could  not  be  much  expected.  Perhaps, 
indeed,  where  the  liver  and  other  organs  had,  for  so  large 
a  period  in  life,  been  subject  to  a  continual  morbid 
stimulation,  it  may  be  impossible  for  the  system  ever  to 
recover  a  natural  action.  Torpor,  I  suppose,  must  result 
from  continued  artificial  excitement ;  and,  perhaps,  upon 
a  scale  of  corresponding  duration.  Life,  in  such  a  case, 
may  not  offer  a  field  of  sufficient  extent  for  unthreading 
the  fatal  links  that  have  been  wound  about  the  machinery 
of  health,  and  have  crippled  its  natural  play.  Meantime, 
- —  to  resume  the  thread  of  my  wandering  narrative,  —  on 
this  serene  summer  night  of  1807,  as  I  moved  slowly 
along,  with  my  eyes  continually  settling  upon  the  North- 
ern constellations,  which,  like  all  the  fixed  stars,  by 
their  immeasurable  and  almost  spiritual  remoteness  frora 
human  affairs,  naturally  throw  the  thoughts  upon  the 
perishableness  of  our  earthly  troubles,  in  contrast  with 
their  own  utter  peace  and  solemnity,  —  I  reverted,  at 
intervals,  to  all  I  had  ever  heard  of  Coleridge,  and 
strove  to  weave  it  into  some  continuous  sketch  of  hia 
life.  I  hardly  remember  how  much  I  then  knew ;  1 
know  but  little  now  —  that  little  I  will  here  jot  dow< 
Upon  paper. 


SAMIJEI.  TAYLOR  COXERIDQE. 


185 


Samuel  Taylor  Coleridge  was  the  son  of  a  learned 
tlergyman  —  the  vicar  of  Ottery  St.  Mary,  in  the  south- 
ern quarter  of  Devonshire.  It  is  painful  to  mention  that 
he  was  almost  an  object  of  persecution  to  his  mother  ; 
why,  I  could  never  learn.  His  father  was  described  to 
me,  by  Coleridge  himself,  as  a  sort  of  Parson  Adams, 
being  distinguished  by  his  erudition,  his  inexperience  of 
the  world,  and  his  guileless  simplicity.  I  once  purchased 
in  London,  and,  I  suppose,  still  possess,  two  elementary 
books  on  the  Latin  language  by  this  reverend  gentleman  ; 
one  of  them,  as  I  found,  making  somewhat  higher  pre- 
tensions than  a  common  school  grammar.  In  particular, 
an  attempt  is  made  to  reform  the  theory  of  the  cases ; 
and  it  gives  a  pleasant  specimen  of  the  rustic  scholar's 
naivete,  that  he  seriously  proposes  to  banish  such  vexa- 
tious terms  as  the  accusative  ;  and,  by  way  of  simplifying 
the  matter  to  tender  minds,  that  we  should  call  it,  in  all 
time  to  come,  the  '  quale-quare-quidditive '  case,  upon 
what  incomprehensible  principle  I  never  could  fathom. 
He  used  regularly  to  delight  his  village  flock,  on  Sundays, 
with  Hebrew  quotations  in  his  sermons,  which  he  always 
introduced  as  the  'immediate  language  of  the  Holy 
Ghost.'  This  proved  unfortunate  to  his  successor ;  he 
also  was  a  learned  man,  and  his  parishioners  admitted  it, 
but  generally  with  a  sigh  for  past  times,  and  a  sorrowful 
complaint  that  he  was  still  far  below  Parson  Coleridge  — 
for  that  he  never  gave  them  any  '  immediate  language  of 
the  Holy  Ghost.'  I  presume,  that,  like  the  reverend 
gentleman  so  pleasantly  sketched  in  St.  Ronan's  Well, 
Mr.  Coleridge,  who  resembled  that  person  in  his  Oriental 
learning  and  his  simplicity,  must  also  have  resembled 
jiim  in  short-sightedness,  of  which  his  son  used  to  relate  a 
ludicrous  instance.  Dining  in  a  large  party,  one  day,  the 
tnodest  divine  was  suddenly  shocked  by  perceiving  soma 


186 


LITERAKY  BEMINISCENCES. 


part,  as  lie  conceived,  of  his  own  snowy  shirt  emerging 
from  a  part  of  his  habiliments,  which  we  shall  suppose  to 
have  been  his  waistcoat.  It  was  not  that ;  but  for  decorum 
we  shall  so  call  it.  The  stray  portion  of  his  supposed 
tunic  was  admonished  of  its  errors  by  a  forcible  thrust 
back  into  its  proper  home  ;  but  still  another  limhus  per- 
sisted to  emerge,  or  seemed  to  persist,  and  still  another, 
until  the  learned  gentleman  absolutely  perspired  with  the 
labor  of  re-establishing  order.  And,  after  all,  he  saw 
with  anguish,  that  some  arrears  of  the  snowy  indecorum 
still  remained  to  reduce  into  obedience.  To  this  remnant 
of  rebellion  he  was  proceeding  to  apply  himself  — 
strangely  confounded,  however,  at  the  obstinacy  of  the 
insurrection  —  when  the  mistress  of  the  house,  rising  to 
lead  away  the  ladies  from  the  table,  and  all  parties 
naturally  rising  with  her,  it  became  suddenly  apparent  to 
every  eye,  that  the  worthy  Orientalist  had  been  most 
laboriously  stowing  away,  into  the  capacious  receptacles 
of  his  own  habiliments,  the  snowy  folds  of  a  lady's  gown, 
belonging  to  his  next  neighbor ;  and  so  voluminously,  that 
a  very  small  portion  of  it,  indeed,  remained  for  the  lady's 
own  use ;  the  natural  consequence  of  which  was,  of 
course,  that  the  lady  appeared  almost  inextricably  yoked 
to  the  learned  theologian,  and  could  not  in  any  way  effect 
her  release,  until  after  certain  operations  upon  the  Vicar's 
dress,  and  a  continued  refunding  and  rolling  out  of  snowy 
mazes  upon  snowy  mazes,  in  quantities  which,  at  length, 
proved  too  much  for  the  gravity  of  the  company.  Inex- 
tinguishable laughter  arose  from  all  parties,  except  the 
erring  and  unhappy  doctor,  who,  in  dire  perplexity, 
continued  still  refunding  with  all  his  might,  until  he  had 
paid  up  the  last  arrears  of  his  long  debt,  and  thus  put  an 
end  to  a  cas9  of  distress  more  memorable  to  himself  and 
.lis  parishioners,  than  any  quale- quare-quidditive^  casn 
that  probably  had  ever  perplexed  his  learning. 


SAMUEL  TATIiOB  COLEBIDGE. 


187 


In  his  childisli  days,  and  when  he  had  become  an 
orphan,  S.  T.  Coleridge  was  removed  to  the  heart  of 
London,  and  placed  on  the  great  foundation  of  Christ's 
Hospital.  He  there  found  himself  associated,  as  a  school- 
fellow, with  several  boys  destined  to  distinction  in  after 
life,  and  especially  with  one  who,  if  not  endowed  with 
powers  equally  large  and  comprehensive,  had,  however, 
genius  not  less  original  or  exquisite  than  his  own  —  the 
inimitable  Charles  Lamb.  But,  in  learning,  Coleridge 
outstripped  all  competitors,  and  rose  to  be  the  Captain  of 
the  school.  It  is  indeed  a  most  memorable  fact  to  be 
recorded  of  a  boy,  that,  before  completing  his  fifteenth 
year,  he  had  translated  the  Greek  Hymns  of  Synesius 
into  English  anacreontic  verse.  This  was  not  a  school 
task,  but  a  labor  of  love  and  choice  ;  to  appreciate  which, 
it  is  necessary  to  recall  the  dark  philosophy  which  con- 
stitutes the  theme  of  Synesius,  Before  leaving  school, 
Coleridge  had  an  opportunity  of  reading  the  sonnets  of 
Bowles,  which  so  powerfully  impressed  his  poetic  sensi- 
bility, that  he  made  forty  transcripts  of  them  with  his  own 
pen,  by  way  of  presents  to  youthful  friends.  From 
Christ's  Hospital,  by  the  privilege  of  his  station  at  school, 
he  was  transferred  to  Jesus  College,  Cambridge.  It  was 
here,  no  doubt,  that  his  acquaintance  began  with  the 
philosophic  system  of  Hartley,  for  that  eminent  person 
had  been  a  Jesus  man.  Frend  also,  the  mathematician, 
of  heretical  memory,  belonged  to  that  College,  and  was 
probably  contemporary  with  Coleridge.  What  accident, 
or  imprudence,  carried  him  away  from  Cambridge  before 
he  had  completed  the  usual  period  of  study,  or  (I  believe) 
taken  his  degree,  I  never  heard.  He  had  certainly  won 
some  distinction  as  a  scholar,  having  obtained  the  prize 
for  a  Greek  ode  in  Sapphic  metre,  of  which  the  senti- 
ments (as  he  observes  himself)  were  better  than  the 


188 


LITERARY  REAHNISCENCES. 


Greek.  Person  was  accustomed,  meanly  enough^  to  ridi- 
cule the  Greek  lex^is  of  this  ode,  which  was  to  break  a 
fly  upon  the  wheel.  The  ode  was  clever  enough  for  a 
boy ;  but  to  such  skill  in  Greek  as  could  have  enabled 
him  to  compose  with  critical  accuracy,  Coleridge  nevei 
made  pretensions.  He  had,  however,  a  far  more  philo- 
sophic insight  into  much  of  the  structure  of  that  language 
than  Porson  had,  or  could  have  comprehended. 

The  incidents  of  Coleridge's  life  about  this  period,  and 
some  account  of  a  heavy  disappointment  in  love,  which 
probably  it  was  that  carried  him  away  from  Cambridge, 
are  to  be  found  embodied  (with  what  modifications  I  know 
n,  t)  in  the  novel  of  '  Edmund  Oliver,'  written  by  the  late 
Charles  Lloyd.  It  is  well  known  that,  in  a  frenzy  of 
unhappy  feeling  at  the  rejection  he  met  with  from  the 
lady  of  his  choice,  Coleridge  enlisted  as  a  private  into  a. 
dragoon  regiment.  He  fell  off  his  horse  on  several  occa- 
sions, but,  perhaps,  not  more  than  raw  recruits  are  apt 
to  do  when  first  put  under  the  riding-master.  But  Coler- 
idge was  naturally  ill  framed  for  a  good  horseman.  He 
is  also  represented  in  '  Edmund  Oliver,'  as  having  found 
peculiar  difficulty  or  annoyance  in  grooming  his  horse. 
But  the  most  romantic  incident  in  that  scene  of  his  life 
was  in  the  circumstances  of  his  discharge.  It  is  said  (but 
I  vouch  for  no  part  of  the  story)  that  Coleridge,  as  a 
private,  mounted  guard  at  the  door  of  a  room  in  which 
his  officers  happened  to  give  a  ball.  Two  of  them  had  a 
dispute  upon  some  Greek  word  or  passage  when  close  to 
Coleridge's  station.  He  interposed  his  authentic  decision 
of  the  case.  The  oflficers  stared  as  though  one  of  their 
own  horses  had  sung  '  Rule  Britannia  ;  '  questioned  him ; 
heard  his  story  ;  pitied  his  misfortunes  ;  and,  finally,  sub- 
Bcribed  to  purchase  his  discharge.  Not  very  long  after 
this,  ColeridgB  became  acauainted  with  the  two  Wedg* 


SAMUEL  TAYLOlt  COLERIDaE. 


189 


jvoods,  both  of  whom,  admiring  his  fine  powers,  subscribed 
to  send  him  into  North  Germany,  where,  at  the  university 
of  Gottingen,  he  completed  his  education  according  to 
his  own  scheme.  The  most  celebrated  professor  whose 
lectures  he  attended,  was  the  far-famed  Blumenbach,  of 
whom  he  continued  to  speak  through  life  with  almost 
filial  reverence.  Returning  to  England,  he  attended  Mr. 
Thomas  Wedgwood,  as  a  friend,  throughout  the  afflicting 
and  anomalous  illness  which  brought  him  to  the  grave. 
It  was  supposed  by  medical  men  that  the  cause  of  Mr. 
Wedgwood's  continued  misery  was  a  stricture  of  some 
part  in  the  intestines  (the  colon,  it  was  believed).  The 
external  symptoms  were  torpor  and  defective  irritability, 
together  with  everlasting  restlessness.  By  way  of  some 
relief  to  this  latter  symptom,  Mr.  Wedgwood  purchased  a 
travelling  carriage,  and  wandered  up  and  down  England, 
taking  Coleridge  as  his  companion.  And,  as  a  desperate 
attempt  to  rouse  and  irritate  the  decaying  sensibility  of 
his  system,  I  have  been  assured  by  a  surviving  friend, 
that  Mr.  Wedgwood  at  one  time  opened  a  butcher's  shop, 
^Conceiving  that  the  affronts  and  disputes  to  which  such  a 
Bituation  would  expose  him,  might  act  beneficially  upon 
his  increasing  torpor.  This  strange  expedient*  served 
only  to  express  the  anguish  which  had  now  mastered  his 
nature :  it  was  soon  abandoned ;  and  this  accomplished 
but  miserable  man  soon  sank  under  his  sufferings.  What 

*  Which,  however,  his  brother  denied  as  a  pure  fable.  On  reading 
this  account,  he  wrote  to  me,  and  in  very  courteous  terms  assured 
me  that  I  had  been  misinformed.  I  now  retain  the  story,  simply  as  a 
version,  partially  erroneous,  no  doubt,  of  perhaps  some  true  anecdote 
that  may  have  escaped  the  surviving  Mr.  Wedgwood's  knowledge ; 
my  reason  for  thinking  thus  being,  that  the  same  anecdote  essentially, 
but  varied  in  the  circumstances,  has  reached  me  at  different  periods 
ftpom  parties  having  no  connection  whatsoever. 


190 


lilTESAKY  REMINISCENCES. 


made  the  case  more  memorable  was  the  combination  of 
worldly  prosperity  which  had  settled  upon  this  gentleman 
He  was  rich,  young,  generally  beloved,  distinguished  fbr 
his  scientific  attainments,  publicly  honored  for  patriotic 
services,  and  had  before  him,  when  he  first  fell  ill,  every 
prospect  of  a  splendid  and  most  useful  career. 

By  the  death  of  Mr.  Wedgwood,  Coleridge  succeeded 
to  a  regular  annuity  of  £75,  which  that  gentleman  had 
bequeathed  to  him.  The  other  Mr.  Wedgwood  granted 
him  an  equal  allowance.  Now  came  his  marriage,  his 
connection  with  politics  and  political  journals,  his  residence 
in  various  parts  of  Somersetshire,  and  his  consequent 
introduction  to  Mr.  Wordsworth.  In  his  politics,  Mr. 
Coleridge  was  most  sincere  and  most  enthusiastic.  No 
man  hailed  with  profounder  sympathy  the  French  Revolu- 
tion; and  though  he  saw  cause  to  withdraw  his  regard 
from  many  of  the  democratic  zealots  in  this  country,  and 
even  from  the  revolutionary  interest  as  it  was  subsequently 
conducted,  he  continued  to  worship  the  original  revolu- 
tionary cause  in  a  pure  Miltonic  spirit ;  and  he  continued 
also  to  a  Dominate  the  policy  of  Mr.  Pitt  in  a  degree  which 
I  myself  find  it  difficult  to  understand.  The  very  spirited 
little  poem  of  '  Fire,  Famine,  and  Slaughter,'  who  are 
supposed  to  meet  in  conference,  to  describe  their  horrid 
triumphs,  and  then  to  ask  in  a  whisper  who  it  was  that 
unchained  them,  to  which  each  in  turn  replies, 

•  Letters  four  do  form  his  name  !  * 

expresses  his  horror  of  Mr.  Pitt  personally  in  a  mosi 
extravagant  shape,  but  merely  for  the  purpose  of  poetic 
effect ;  for  he  had  no  real  unkindness  in  his  heart  towards 
any  human  being ;  and  I  have  often  heard  him  disclaim 
the  hatred  which  is  here  expressed  for  Mr.  Pitt,  as  he  did 
also  very  nlaborately  and  earnestly  in  print.  Somewhere 


SAMUEL  TAYLOR  COLERIDGE. 


]91 


about  this  time,  Coleridge  attempted,  under  Sheridan's 
countenance,  to  bring  a  tragedy  upon  the  stage  of  Drury 
liane;  but  his  prospect  of  success,  as  I  once  heard  or 
read,  was  suddenly  marred  by  Mr.  Sheridan's  inability  to 
sacrifice  what  he  thought  a  good  jest.  One  scene  pre- 
sented a  cave  with  streams  of  water  weeping  down  the 
sides ;  and  the  first  words  were,  in  a  sort  of  mimicry  of 
the  sound,  '  Drip,  drip,  drip ! '  Upon  which  Sheridan 
repeated  aloud,  *  Drip,  drip,  drip  !  —  why,  God  bless  me, 
there's  nothing  here  but  dripping ; '  and  so  arose  a  chorus 
of  laughter  amongst  the  actors  fatal  to  the  probationary 
play 


192 


iitTERA^RY  REMINISCENCEll. 


CHAPTER  VII. 

SAMUEL  TAYLOR  COLERIDGE. 

About  the  latter  tend  of  the  century,  Coleridge  visited 
North  Germany  again,  in  company  with  Mr.  and  Miss 
Wordsworth.  Their  tour  was  chiefly  confined  to  the 
Hartz  forest  and  its  neighborhood.  But  the  incident 
most  worthy  of  remembrance  in  their  excursion,  was  a 
visit  made  to  Klopstock;  whom  they  found  either  at 
Hamburgh  or,  perhaps,  at  the  Danish  town  (as  then  it 
was)  of  Altona ;  for  Klopstock  was  a  pensioner  of  the 
Danish  king.  An  anonymous  writer,  who  attacked  Coler- 
idge most  truculently  in  an  early  number  of  Blackwood, 
and  with  an  acharnement  that  must  astonish  those  who 
knew  its  object,  has  made  the  mistake  of  supposing  Coler- 
idge to  have  been  the  chief  speaker,  who  did  not  speak 
at  all.  The  case  was  this :  Klopstock  could  not  speak 
English,  though  everybody  remembers  the  pretty  broken 
English^  of  his  second  wife.  Neither  Coleridge  nor 
Wordsworth,  on  the  other  hand,  spoke  German  with  any 
fluency.  French,  therefore,  was  the  only  medium  of  free 
communication;  that  being  pretty  equally  familiar  to 
Wordsworth  and  to  Klopstock.  But  Coleridge  found  so 
much  difficulty  even  in  reading  French,  that,  wherever 
(as  in  the  case  of  ^Leibnitz's  Theodicee')  there  was  a 
choice  between  an  original  written  in  French  and  a 
translatioa,  though  it  might  be  a  very  faulty  one,  in  Ger- 


SAMUEL  TAYLOK  COLERIDGE. 


193 


man,  he  always  preferred  the  latter.  Hence,  it  happened 
that  Wordsworth,  on  behalf  of  the  English  party,  was  the 
sole  supporter  of  the  dialogue.  The  anonymous  critic 
says  another  thing,  which  certainly  has  an  air  of  truth 
viz.  that  Klopstock  plays  a  very  secondary  role  in  the 
interview  (or  words  to  that  effect).  But  how  was  that  to 
be  avoided  in  reporting  the  case,  supposing  the  fact  to  have 
been  such  ?  Now  the  plain  truth  is,  that  Wordsworth, 
upon  his  own  ground,  is  an  incomparable  talker  ;  whereas, 
Klubstick  (as  Coleridge  used  to  call  him)  was  always  a 
feeble  and  careless  one.  Besides,  he  was  now  old  and 
decaying.  Nor  at  any  time,  nor  in  any  accomplishment, 
could  Klopstock  have  shone,  unless  in  the  noble  art  of 
skating.  Wordsworth  did  the  very  opposite  of  that  with 
which  he  was  taxed ;  for,  happening  to  look  down  at 
Klopstock's  swollen  legs,  and  recollecting  his  age,  he  felt 
touched  by  a  sort  of  filial  pity  for  his  helplessness.  And 
upon  anotRer  principle,  which,  in  my  judgment,  Words- 
worth is  disposed  to  carry  too  far,  viz.  the  forbearance, 
and  the  ceremonious  caution  which  he  habitually  concedes 
to  an  established  reputation,  even  where  he  believes  it  to 
have  been  built  on  a  hollow  foundation,  —  he  came  to  the 
conclusion,  that  it  would  not  seem  becoming  in  a  young, 
and  as  yet  obscure  author,  to  report  faithfully  the  real 
superiority  he  too  easily  maintained  in  such  a  colloquy. 

But  neither  had  Klopstock  the  pretensions  as  a  poet, 
which  the  Blackw^ood  writer  seems  to  take  for  granted. 
Germany,  the  truth  is,  wanted  a  great  Epic  poet.  Not 
having  produced  one  in  that  early  condition  of  her  literary 
soil  when  such  a  growth  is  natural  and  favored  by  cir- 
cumstances, the  next  thing  was  to  manufacture  a  substi- 
tute. The  force  of  Coleridge's  well  known  repartee  — 
when,  in  reply  to  a  foreigner  asserting  that  Klopstock  w^as 
the  German  Milton,  he  said,  '  True,  sir ;  a  very  German 
13 


194 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


Milton,'  —  cannot  be  fully  appreciated  but  by  one  who  Ifi 
familiar  with  the  German  poetry,  and  the  small  proportiorA 
in  which  it  is  a  natural  and  spontaneous  product.  It  has 
been  often  noticed,  as  the  misfortune  of  the  Roman 
literature,  that  it  grew  up  too  much  under  the  oppression 
of  Grecian  models,  and  of  Grecian  models  depraved  by 
Alexandrian  art ;  a  fact,  so  far  as  it  was  a  fact,  which 
crippled  the  genial  and  characteristic  spirit  of  the  national 
mind.  But  this  evil,  after  all,  did  not  take  effect  except 
in  a  partial  sense.  Rome  had  cast  much  of  her  literature 
in  her  own  moulds  before  these  exotic  models  had  begun 
to  domineer.  Not  so  with  Germany.  Her  literature, 
since  its  revival  in  the  las"  century  (and  the  revival  upon 
the  impulse  of  what  cattle  !  —  Bodmer  on  the  one  hand, 
and  Gottsched  on  the  other  !)  has  hardly  moved  a  step  in 
the  freedom  of  natural  grace.  England  for  nineteen,  and 
France  for  the  twentieth  of  all  her  capital  works,  has 
given  the  too  servile  law :  and  with  regard  to  ^lopstock, 
if  ever  there  was  a  good  exemplification  of  the  spurious 
and  the  counterfeit  in  literature,  seek  it  in  the  '  Messiah.' 
He  is  verily  and  indeed  the  Birmingham  Milton.  This 
Klopstockian  dialogue,  by  the  way,  was  first  printed 
(hardly  puhlished)  in  the  original,  or  Lake  edition  of 
'  The  Friend.'  In  the  recast  of  that  work  it  was  omitted : 
nor  has  it  been  printed  anywhere  else  that  I  am  aware  of. 

About  the  close  of  the  first  revolutionary  war  it  must 
have  been,  or  in  the  brief  interval  of  peace,  that  Coler- 
idge resorted  to  the  English  Lakes  as  a  place  of  resi- 
dence. Wordsworth  had  a  natural  connection  with  that 
region  by  birth,  breeding,  and  family  alliances.  Words- 
worth attracted  Coleridge  to  the  Lakes  ;  and  Coleridge, 
through  his  affinity  to  Southey,  eventually  attracted  him, 
Southey,  as  is  known  to  all  who  take  an  interest  in  the 
Lake  colony,  married  a  sister  of  Mrs.  Coleridge's  :  ani 


SAMUEL  TAYLOR  COLERIDGE.  195 

fs  a  singular  eccentricity  in  the  circumstances  of  that 
marriage,  I  may  mention,  that,  on  his  wedding  day,  (at 
the  very  portico  of  the  church,  I  have  been  told,)  Southey 
left  his  bride,  to  embark  for  Lisbon.  His  uncle,  Dr. 
Herbert,  was  chaplain  to  the  English  factory  in  that  city  ; 
and  it  was  to  benefit  by  the  facilities  in  that  way  opened 
to  him  for  seeing  Portugal  that  Southey  now  went  abroad. 
He  extended  his  tour  to  Spain  ;  and  the  result  of  his 
notices  was  communicated  to  the  world  in  a  volume  of 
travels.  By  such  accidents  of  personal  or  family  con- 
nection as  I  have  mentioned,  was  the  Lake  colony 
gathered  ;  and  the  critics  of  the  day,  unaware  of  the  real 
facts,  supposed  them  to  have  assembled  under  common 
views  in  literature  —  particularly  with  regard  to  the  true 
functions  of  poetry,  and  the  true  theory  of  poetic  diction. 
Under  this  original  blunder,  laughable  it  is  to  mention, 
that  they  went  on  to  find  in  their  writings  all  the  agree- 
ments and  common  characteristics  which  their  blunder 
had  presumed  :  and  they  incorporated  the  whole  com- 
munity under  the  name  of  the  Lake  School,  Yet 
Wordsworth  and  Southey  never  had  one  principle  in 
common.  Indeed,  Southey  troubled  himself  Jittle  about 
abstract  principles  in  anything  ;  and  so  far  from  agreeing 
with  Wordsworth  to  the  extent  of  setting  up  a  separate 
school  in  poetry,  he  told  me  himself  (August,  1812),  that 
he  highly  disapproved  both  of  Mr.  Wordsworth's  theories 
and  of  his  practice.  It  is  very  true,  that  one  man  may 
sympathize  with  another,  or  even  follow  his  leading, 
unconscious  that  he  does  so  ;  or  he  may  go  so  far  as,  in 
the  very  act  of  virtual  imitation,  to  deem  himself  in 
opposition  ;  but  this  sort  of  blind  agreement  could  hardly 
be  supposed  of  two  men  as  discerning  and  as  self- 
examining  as  Wordsworth  and  Southey.  And,  in  fact,  a 
philciiophic  investigation  of  the  difficult  questions  con- 


196 


LITEBAKY  EEMINISCENCES. 


nected  with  this  whole  slang  about  schools,  Lake  schools, 
&c.,  would  show  that  Southey  has  not,  nor  ever  had,  any 
peculiarities  in  common  with  Wordsworth,  beyond  that  of 
exchanging  the  old  prescriptive  diction  of  poetry,  intro- 
duced between  the  periods  of  Milton  and  Cowper,  for  the 
simpler  and  profounder  forms  of  daily  life  in  some 
instances,  and  of  the  Bible  in  others.  The  bold  and 
uniform  practice  of  Wordsworth  was  here  adopted  timidly 
by  Southey.  In  this  respect,  however,  Cowper  had 
already  begun  the  reform  ;  and  his  influence,  concurring 
with  the  now  larger  influence  of  Wordsworth,  has  operated 
so  extensively,  as  to  make  their  own  original  diflerences 
at  this  day  less  perceptible. 

By  the  way,  the  word  colony,  reminds  me  that  I  have 
omitted  to  mention,  in  its  proper  place,  some  scheme  for 
migrating  to  America,  which  had  been  entertained  by 
Coleridge  and  Southey  about  the  year  1794-95,  under 
the  learned  name  of  Pantisocracy,  So  far  as  I  ever  heard, 
it  differed  little,  except  in  its  Grecian  name,  from  any 
other  scheme  for  mitigating  the  privations  of  a  wilderness, 
by  settling  in  a  cluster  of  families  bound  together  by 
congenial  tastes  and  uniform  principles,  rather  than  in 
self-depending,  insulated  households.  Steadily  pursued, 
it  might,  after  all,  have  been  a  fortunate  plan  for  Coler- 
idge. '  Soliciting  my  food  from  daily  toil,*  a  line  in 
ivhich  Coleridge  alludes  to  the  scheme,  implies  a  condition 
that  would  have  upheld  Coleridge's  health  and  happiness, 
Bomewhat  better  than  the  habits  of  luxurious  city  life  as 
now  constituted  in  Europe.  To  return  to  the  Lakes,  and 
to  the  Lake  colony  of  poets :  —  So  little  were  Southey 
and  Wordsworth  connected  by  any  personal  intercourse 
m  those  days,  and  so  little  disposed  to  be  connected,  that, 
ivhilst  the  latter  had  a  cottage  in  Grasmere,  Southey 
pitched  his  tent  at  Greta  Hall,  on  a  little  eminence  rising 


SAMUEL  TATLOB  COLERIDGE. 


197 


immediately  from  the  romantic  river  Greta  and  the  town 
of  Keswick.  Grasmere  is  in  Westmoreland  ;  Keswick  in 
Cumberland ;  and  they  are  thirteen  good  miles  apart. 
Coleridge  and  his  family  were  domiciliated  in  Greta  Hall, 
sharing  that  house,  a  tolerably  large  one,  on  some 
principle  of  amicable  division,  with  Mr.  Southcy.  But 
Coleridge  personally  was  more  often  to  be  found  at 
Grasmere  —  which  presented  the  threefold  attractions  of 
loveliness  so  complete,  as  to  eclipse  even  the  scenery  of 
Derwentwater  ;  a  pastoral  state  of  society,  free  from  the 
deformities  of  a  little  town  like  Keswick ;  and,  finally, 
the  society  of  Wordsworth.  Not  before  1815,  or  1816, 
could  it  be  said  that  Southey  and  Wordsworth  were  even 
upon  friendly  terms  :  so  entirely  is  it  untrue  that  they 
combined  to  frame  a  school  of  poetry.  Up  to  that  time, 
they  viewed  each  other  with  mutual  respect,  but  also  with 
mutual  dislike ;  almost,  I  might  say,  with  mutual  disgust. 
Wordsworth  disliked  in  Southey  the  want  of  depth,  as 
regards  the  power  of  philosophic  abstraction,  of  compre- 
hensive views,  and  of  severe  principles  of  thought. 
Southey  disliked  in  Wordsworth  the  air  of  dogmatism, 
and  the  unaffable  haughtiness  of  his  manner.  Other 
more  trivial  reasons  combined  with  these. 

At  this  time,  when  Coleridge  first  settled  at  the  Lakea, 
or  not  long  after,  a  romantic  and  somewhat  tragical  afiair 
drew  the  eyes  of  all  England,  and,  for  many  years,  con- 
tinued to  draw  the  steps  of  tourists,  to  one  of  the  most 
secluded  Cumberland  valleys,  so  little  visited  previously, 
that  it  might  be  described  almost  as  an  undiscovered 
chamber  of  that  romantic  district.  Coleridge  was  brought 
into  a  closer  connection  with  this  afiair  than  merely  by  the 
general  relation  of  neighborhood;  for  an  article  of  his 
\n  a  morning  paper,  I  believe,  unintentionally  furnished 
\he  original  clew  for  unmasking  the  base  impostor  who 


198 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


figured  as  the  foremost  actor  in  this  tale.  Other  genera- 
tions have  arisen  since  that  time,  who  must  naturally  be 
unacquainted  with  the  circumstances ;  and,  on  their 
account,  I  shall  here  recall  them.  One  day  in  the  Lake 
season,  there  drove  up  to  the  Royal  Oak,  the  principal  inn 
at  Keswick,  a  handsome  and  well-appointed  travelling 
carriage,  containing  one  gentleman  of  somewhat  dashing 
exterior.  The  stranger  was  a  picturesque-hunter,  but  not 
of  that  order  who  fly  round  the  ordinary  tour  with  the 
velocity  of  lovers  posting  to  Gretna,  or  of  criminals  run- 
ning from  the  police ;  his  purpose  was  to  domiciliate 
himself  in  this  beautiful  scenery,  and  to  see  it  at  his 
leisure.  From  Keswick,  as  his  head-quarters,  he  made 
excursions  in  every  direction  amongst  the  neighboring 
valleys  ;  meeting  generally  a  good  deal  of  respect  and 
attention,  partly  on  account  of  his  handsome  equipage, 
and  still  more  from  his  visiting  cards,  which  designated 
him  as  '  The  Hon.  Augustus  Hope.'  Under  this  name, 
he  gave  himself  out  for  a  brother  of  Lord  Hopetoun's, 
whose  great  income  was  well  known,  and,  perhaps, 
exaggerated  amongst  the  dalesmen  of  northern  England. 
Some  persons  had  discernment  enough  to  doubt  of  this ; 
for  the  man's  breeding  and  deportment,  though  showy, 
had  a  tang  of  vulgarity  about  it ;  and  Coleridge  assured 
me,  that  he  was  grossly  ungrammatical  in  his  ordinary 
onversation.  However,  one  fact,  soon  dispersed  by  the 
people  of  a  little  rustic  post-office,  laid  asleep  all  demurs  ; 
he  not  only  received  letters  addressed  to  him  under  this 
assumed  name  —  that  might  be  through  collusion  with 
accomplices  —  but  he  himself  continually  franked  letters 
by  that  name.  Now,  that  being  a  capital  ofl*ence,  being 
not  only  a  forgery,  but,  (as  a  forgery  on  the  Post-office,) 
sure  to  be  prosecuted,  nobody  presumed  to  question  hia 
pretensions  any  longer ;  and,  henceforwaid,  he  went  to 


SAMUEL  TAYLOR  COLERIDGE. 


199 


^11  places  with  the  consideration  attached  to  an  Earl's 
brother.  All  doors  flew  open  at  his  approach  ;  boats, 
boatmen,  nets,  and  the  most  unlimited  sporting  privileges, 
were  placed  at  the  disposal  of  the  '  Honorable  '  gentle- 
man :  and  the  hospitality  of  the  whole  country  taxed  itself 
to  offer  a  suitable  reception  to  the  patrician  Scotsman.  It 
could  be  no  blame  to  a  shepherd  girl,  bred  in  the  sternest 
solitude  which  England  has  to  show,  that  she  should  fall 
into  a  snare  which  hardly  any  of  her  betters  had  escaped. 
Nine  miles  from  Keswick,  by  the  nearest  bridle-road,  but 
fourteen  or  fifteen  by  any  route  which  the  honorable 
gentleman's  travelling  carriage  could  have  traversed,  lies 
the  Lake  of  Buttermere.  Its  margin,  which  is  overhung 
by  some  of  the  loftiest  and  steepest  of  the  Cumbrian 
mountains,  exhibits  on  either  side  few  traces  of  human 
neighborhood;  the  level  area,  where  the  hills  recede 
enough  to  allow  of  any,  is  of  a  wild  pastoral  character,  or 
almost  savage ;  the  waters  of  the  lake  are  deep  and 
sullen  ;  and  the  barrier  mountains,  by  excluding  the  suu 
for  much  of  his  Saily  course,  strengthen  the  gloomy  im- 
pressions. At  the  foot  of  this  lake  (that  is,  at  the  end 
where  its  waters  issue)  lie  a  few  unornamented  fields, 
through  which  rolls  a  little  brook-like  river  connecting  it 
with  the  larger  Lake  of  Crummock  ;  and  at  the  edge  of 
this  miniature  domain,  upon  the  roadside,  stands  a  cluster 
of  cottages,  so  small  and  few  that,  in  the  richer  tracts  of 
the  islands,  they  would  scarcely  be  complimented  with 
the  name  of  hamlet.  One  of  these,  and  I  believe  the 
principal,  belonged  to  an  independent  proprietor,  called. 
In  the  local  dialect,  a  '  Statesman  ;  '  ^'  and  more,  perhaps, 
*br  the  sake  of  gathering  any  little  local  news,  than  with 

*  i.  e.  —  A  'Statesman  ellipticalTy  for  an  Estatesman  —  a  native 
dalesman  possessing  and  personally  cultivating  a  patrimonial  landed 
fstate. 


200 


LITEHAUr  REMIlTISCElSrCES. 


much  view  to  pecuniary  profit  at  that  era,  this  cottage 
offered  the  accommodations  of  an  inn  to  the  traveller  and 
his  horse.  Rare,  however,  must  have  been  the  mounted 
traveller  in  those  days,  unless  visiting  Buttermere  for 
itself  and  as  a  terminus  ad  quern  ;  for  the  road  led  to  no 
further  habitation  of  man,  with  the  exception  of  some 
four  or  five  pastoral  cabins,  equally  humble,  in  Gates- 
garth  Dale. 

Hither,  however,  in  an  evil  hour  for  the  peace  of  this 
little  brotherhood  of  shepherds,  came  the  cruel  spoiler 
from  Keswick.  His  errand  was,  to  witness  or  to  share  in 
the  char-fishing  ;  for  in  Der  went  water  (the  Lake  of 
Keswick)  no  char  is  found,  which  breeds  only  in  the 
deeper  waters,  such  as  Windermere,  Crummock,  Butter- 
mere,  &c.  But  whatever  had  been  his  first  object,  that 
was  speedily  forgotten  in  one  more  deeply  interesting. 
The  daughter  of  the  house,  a  fine  young  woman  of 
eighteen,  acted  as  waiter.^  In  a  situation  so  solitary,  the 
stranger  had  unlimited  facilities  for  enjoying  her  com- 
pany, and  recommending  himself  to  her  favor.  Doubts 
about  his  pretensions  never  arose  in  so  simple  a  place  as 
this  ;  they  were  overruled  before  they  could  well  have 
arisen,  by  the  opinion  now  general  in  Keswick  that  he 
really  was  what  he  pretended  to  be ;  and  thus,  with  little 
demur  except  in  the  shape  of  a  few  natural  words  of 
parting  anger  from  a  defeated  or  rejected  rustic  admirer, 
the  young  woman  gave  her  hand  in  marriage  to  the 

*  Waiter :  —  since  this  was  first  written,  social  changes  in  Lon- 
don, by  introducing  females  very  extensively  into  the  office  (once 
monopolized  by  men)  of  attending  the  visitors  at  the  tables  of  eating- 
houses,  have  introduced  a  corresponding  new  word,  viz.  waitress; 
which  word,  twenty-five  years  back,  would  have  been  simply  ludri* 
crous;  but  now  has  become  as  indispensable  to  precision  of  language 
%s  the  words,  traitress,  heiress,  inheritrix,  &c. 


SAMUEL  TAYLOR  COLERIDGE. 


201 


ihowy  and  unprincipled  stranger.  I  know  not  whether 
the  marriage  was,  or  could  have  been  celebrated  in  the 
little  mountain  chapel  of  Buttermere.  If  it  were,  I  per- 
suade myself  that  the  most  hardened  villain  must  have 
felt  a  momentary  pang  on  violating  the  altar  of  such  a 
chapel,  so  touchingly  does  it  express,  by  its  miniature 
dimensions,  the  almost  helpless  humility  of  that  little 
pastoral  community  to  whose  spiritual  wants  it  has  from 
generation  to  generation  administered.  It  is  not  only  the 
very  smallest  chapel  by  many  degrees  in  all  England,  but 
is  so  mere  a  toy  in  outward  appearance,  that,  were  it  not 
for  its  antiquity,  its  wild  mountain  exposure,  and  its  con- 
secrated connection  with  the  final  hopes  and  fears  of  the 
adjacent  pastoral  hamlet  —  but  for  these  considerations, 
the  first  movement  of  a  stranger's  feelings  would  be  to- 
svards  loud  laughter ;  for  the  little  chapel  looks  not  so 
,  much  a  mimic  chapel  in  a  drop  scene  from  the  Opera 
House,  as  a  miniature  copy  from  such  a  scene  ;  and  evi- 
dently could  not  receive  within  its  walls  more  than  a  half 
dozen  of  households.  From  this  sanctuary  it  was  —  from 
beneath  the  maternal  shadow,  if  not  from  the  altar  ^  of 
this  lonely  chapel  —  that  the  heartless  villain  carried  off 
the  flower  of  the  mountains.  Between  this  place  and 
Keswick  they  continued  to  move  backwards  and  forwards, 
until  at  length,  with  the  startling  of  a  thunderclap  to  the 
afirighted  mountaineers,  the  bubble  burst :  officers  of 
fustice  appeared  :  the  stranger  was  easily  intercepted  from 
flight ;  and,  upon  a  capital  charge,  was  borne  away  to 
Carlisle.    At  the  ensuing  assizes  he  was  tried  for  forgery, 

*  My  doubt  is  founded  upon  the  varymg  tenure  of  these  secluded 
chapels  as  to  privileges  of  marrying  or  burying.  The  mere  name  of 
chapel,  though,  of  course,  in  regular  connection  "with  some  mother 
ihurch,  does  not  of  itself  imply  whether  it  has  or  has  not  the  power 
to  solemnize  a  marriage. 


202 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


on  the  prosecution  of  the  Post-office  ;  found  guilty,  left 
for  execution,  and  executed  accordingly.  On  the  day  of 
his  condemnation,  Wordsworth  and  Coleridge  passed 
through  Carlisle,  and  endeavored  to  ohtain  an  interview 
with  him.  Wordsworth  succeeded  ;  hut,  for  some  un- 
known reason,  the  prisoner  steadily  refused  to  see  Coler- 
idge ;  a  caprice  which  could  not  be  penetrated.  It  is 
true  that  he  had,  during  his  whole  residence  at  Keswick, 
avoided  Coleridge  with  a  solicitude  which  had  revived  the 
original  suspicions  against  him  in  some  quarters,  after 
they  had  generally  subsided.  But  for  this,  his  motive 
had  then  been  sufficient :  he  was  of  a  Devonshire  family, 
and  naturally  feared  the  eye,  or  the  inquisitive  examina- 
tion, of  one  who  bore  a  name  immemorially  associated 
with  the  southern  part  of  that  county. 

Coleridge,  however,  had  been  transplanted  so  imma- 
turely  from  his  native  region,  that  few  people  in  England  m 
knew  less  of  its  family  connections.  That,  perhaps,  was 
unknown  to  this  malefactor ;  but  at  any  rate  he  knew  that 
all  motive  was  now  at  an  end  for  disguise  of  any  sort ;  so 
that  his  reserve,  in  this  particular,  was  unintelligible. 
However,  if  not  him,  Coleridge  saw  and  examined  his 
very  interesting  papers.  These  were  chiefly  letters  from 
women  whom  he  had  injured,  pretty  much  in  the  same 
way  and  by  the  same  impostures  as  he  had  so  recently 
practised  in  Cumberland  ;  and,  as  Coleridge  assured  me, 
were  in  part  the  most  agonizing  appeals  that  he  had  ever 
read  to  human  justice  and  pity.  The  man's  real  name 
was,  I  think,  Hatfield.  And  amongst  the  papers  were 
two  separate  correspondences,  of  some  length,  frjm  two 
young  women,  apparently  of  superior  condition  in  life, 
(one  the  daughter  of  an  English  clergyman,)  whom  this 
villain  had  deluded  by  marriage,  and,  after  some  cohabi- 
tation, abandoned  —  one  of  them  with  a  family  of  young 


SAMUEL  TAYLOR  COLERIDGE. 


203 


children.  Great  was  the  emotion  of  Coleridge  when  he 
recurred  to  his  remembrance  of  these  letters,  and  bitter 
—  almost  vindictive  —  was  the  indignation  with  which  he 
Bpoke  of  Hatfield.  One  set  of  letters  appeared  to  have 
been  written  under  too  certain  a  knowledge  of  Ids  villany 
to  whom  they  were  addressed  ;  though  still  relying  on 
some  possible  remains  of  humanity,  or  perhaps,  (the  poor 
writer  might  think,)  on  some  lingering  relics  of  affection 
for  herself.  The  other  set  was  even  more  distressing  ; 
they  were  written  under  the  first  conflicts  of  suspicions, 
alternately  repelling  with  warmth  the  gloomy  doubts 
which  were  fast  arising,  and  then  yielding  to  their  afflict- 
ing evidence  :  raving  in  one  page  under  the  misery  of 
alarm,  in  another  courting  the  delusions  of  hope,  and 
luring  back  the  perfidious  deserter  —  here  resigning 
herself  to  despair,  and  there  again  laboring  to  show  that 
,  all  might  yet  be  well.  Coleridge  said  often,  in  looking 
back  upon  that  frightful  exposure  of  human  guilt  and 
misery  —  and  I  also  echoed  his  feeling  —  that  the  man 
who,  when  pursued  by  these  heart-rending  apostrophes, 
and  with  this  litany  of  anguish  sounding  in  his  ears,  from 
despairing  women,  and  from  famishing  children,  could 
yet  find  it  possible  to  enjoy  the  calm  pleasures  of  a  Lake 
tourist,  and  deliberately  to  hunt  for  the  picturesque,  must 
have  been  a  fiend  of  that  order  which  fortunately  doe^ 
not  often  emerge  amongst  men.  It  is  painful  to  remem- 
ber that,  in  those  days,  amongst  the  multitudes  who  ended 
their  career  in  the  same  ignominious  way,  and  the 
majority  for  offences  connected  with  the  forgery  of  Bank 
notes,  there  must  have  been  a  considerable  number  who 
perished  from  the  very  opposite  cause  —  viz.  because 
ihey  felt,  too  passionately  and  profoundly  for  prudence, 
the  claims  of  those  who  looked  up  to  them  for  support. 
One  common  scaffold  confounds  the  most  flinty  heart« 


204 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


ana  the  tenderest.  However,  in  this  instance,  it  was  m 
some  measure  the  heartless  part  of  Hatfield's  conduct, 
which  drew  upon  him  his  ruin  :  for  the  Cumberland  Jury, 
as  I  have  boen  told,  declared  their  unwillingness  to  hang 
him  for  having  forged  a  frank  :  and  both  they,  and  those 
who  refused  to  aid  his  escape,  when  first  apprehended, 
were  reconciled  to  this  harshness  entirely  by  what  they 
heard  of  his  conduct  to  their  injured  young  fellow- 
countrywoman. 

She,  meantime,  under  the  name  of  the  Beauty  of 
Buttermere,  became  an  object  of  interest  to  all  England  : 
dramas  and  melo-dramas  were  produced  in  the  London 
wuburban  ^*  theatres  upon  her  story  ;  and  for  many  a  year 

*  In  connection  with  this  mention  of  '  suburban  '  and  minor 
theatres,  it  is  but  fair  to  cite  a  passage  relating  expressly  to  Mary  of 
But tei  mere  from  the  Seventh  Book  (entitled  *  Residence  in  Lcn- 
3on ')  of  Wordsworth's  *  Prelude  '  :  — 

*  Here,  too,  were  forms  and  pressures  of  the  timet 
Rough,  bold,  as  Grecian  comedy  display'd 
When  Art  was  young;  dramas  of  living  men, 
And  recent  things  yet  warm  with  life;  a  sea-fight. 
Shipwreck,  or  some  domestic  incident 
Divulged  by  Truth,  and  magnified  by  fame  ; 
Such  as  the  daring  brotherhood  of  late 
Set  forth,  too  serious  theme  for  that  light  place  — «• 
I  mean,  0  distant  friend  !  a  story  drawn 
From  our  own  ground  —  the  Maid  of  Buttermere; 
And  how,  unfaithful  to  a  virtuous  wife, 
Deserted  and  deceived,  the  spoiler  came 
And  woo'd  the  artless  daughter  of  the  hills, 
And  wedded  her,  in  cruel  mockery 
Of  love  and  marriage  bonds.    These  words  to  thee 
Must  needs  bring  back  the  moment  when  we  first. 
Ere  the  broad  world  rang  with  the  maiden's  namOf 
Beheld  her  serving  at  the  cottage  inn, 
Both  stricken,  as  she  enter 'd  or  withdrew, 
^ith  admiration  of  her  modest  mien 


SAMUEL  TAYLOR  COLERIDGE.  205 

afterwards,  slioals  of  tourists  crowded  to  the  secluded  lake, 
and  the  little  homely  cabaret,  which  had  been  the  scene  of 
her  brief  romance.  It  was  fortunate  for  a  person  in  het 
distressing  situation,  that  her  home  was  not  in  a  town  . 
the  few,  and  simple  neighbors,  who  had  witnessed  her 
imaginary  elevation,  having  little  knowledge  of  worldly 
feelings,  never  for  an  instant  connected  with  her  disap- 
pointment any  sense  of  the  ludicrous,  or  spoke  of  it  as  a 
calamity  to  which  her  vanity  might  have  co-operated. 
They  treated  it  as  unmixed  injury,  reflecting  shame  upon 
nobody  but  the  wicked  perpetrator.  Hence,  without  much 
trial  to  her  womanly  sensibilities,  she  found  herself  able 
to  resume  her  situation  in  the  little  inn  ;  and  this  she 
continued  to  hold  for  many  years.  In  that  place,  and 
that  capacity,  I  saw  her  repeatedly,  and  shall  here  say  a 
word  upon  her  personal  appearance,  because  the  Lake 
poets  all  admired  her  greatly.  Her  figure  was,  in  my 
eyes,  good ;  but  I  doubt  whether  most  of  my  readers 
would  have  thought  it  such.  She  was  none  of  your 
evanescent,  wasp-waisted  beauties ;  on  the  contrary,  she 

And  carriage,  mark'd  by  unexampled  grace. 
"We  since  that  time  not  unfamiliarly 
Have  seen  her  —  her  discretion  have  observed. 
Her  just  opinions,  delicate  reserve. 
Her  patience  and  humility  of  mind, 
Unspoil'd  by  commendation  and  th'  excess 
Of  public  notice  —  an  offensive  light 
To  a  meek  spirit  suffering  inwardly.' 

Ihe  *  distant  friend  '  here  apostrophized  is  Coleridge,  then  at  Malta. 
But  it  is  fair  to  record  this  memorial  of  the  fair  mountaineer  — 
going  perhaps  as  much  beyond  the  public  estimate  of  her  pretensions 
AS  my  own  was  below  it.  It  should  be  added,  that  William  Words- 
worth and  Samuel  Taylor  Coleridge  (to  whom  the  writer  appeals,  as 
in  general  sympathy  with  himself)  had  seen  Mary  more  frequently, 
%tid  had  conversed  with  her  much  more  freely,  than  myself. 


206 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES 


was  ratlier  large  every  way ;  tallish,  and  proportionably 
broad.  Her  face  was  fair^  and  her  features  feminine; 
and  unquestionably  she  was  what  all  the  world  have 
agreed  to  call  *  good-looking.'  But,  except  in  her  arms, 
which  had  something  of  a  statuesque  beauty,  and  in  her 
carriage  which  expressed  a  womanly  grace,  together  with 
some  slight  dignity  and  self-possession,  I  confess  that  I 
looked  in  vain  for  any  positive  qualities  of  any  sort  or 
degree.  Beautiful^  in  any  emphatic  sense,  she  was  not. 
Everything  about  her  face  and  bust  was  negative  ;  simply 
without  offence.  Even  this,  however,  was  more  than 
could  be  said  at  all  times :  for  the  expression  of  her 
countenance  was  often  disagreeable.  This  arose  out  of 
her  situation ;  connected  as  it  was  with  defective  sensi- 
bility, and  a  misdirected  pride. 

Nothing  operates  so  differently  upon  different  minds, 
and  different  styles  of  beauty,  as  the  inquisitive  gaze  of 
strangers,  whether  in  the  spirit  of  respectful  admiration, 
or  of  insolence.  Some  I  have  seen,  upon  whose  angelic 
beauty  this  sort  of  confusion  settled  advantageously,  and 
like  a  softening  veil ;  others,  in  whom  it  meets  with  proud 
resentment,  are  sometimes  disfigured  by  it.  In  Mary  of 
Buttermere,  it  roused  mere  anger  and  disdain;  which 
meeting  with  the  sense  of  her  humble  and  dependent 
situation,  gave  birth  to  a  most  unhappy  aspect  of  counte- 
nance. Men,  who  had  no  touch  of  a  gentleman's  nature 
in  their  composition,  sometimes  insulted  her  by  looks  and 
by  words  :  and  she  too  readily  attributed  the  same  spirit 
of  impertinent  curiosity  to  every  man  whose  eyes  hap- 
pened to  settle  steadily  upon  her  face.  Yet,  once  at 
least,  I  must  have  seen  her  under  the  most  favorable 
circumstances :  for  on  my  first  visit  to  Buttermere,  I  had 
the  pleasure  of  Mr.  Southey's  company,  who  was  inca- 
pable of  wounding  anybody's  feelings,  and  to  Mary,  Id 


SAMUEL  TAYLOB  COLERIDGE. 


20*7 


particular,  was  well  known  by  kind  attentions,  and  I 
believe  by  some  services.  Then  at  least  T  saw  her  to 
advantage,  and  perhaps,  for  a  figure  of  her  build,  at  the 
best  age  ;  for  it  was  about  nine  or  ten  years  after  her 
misfortune,  when  she  might  be  twenty-seven  or  twenty- 
eight  years  old.  We  were  alone,  a  solitary  pair  of 
tourists  :  nothing  arose  to  confuse  or  distress  her.  She 
waited  upon  us  at  dinner,  and  talked  to  us  freely.  '  This 
is  a  respectable  young  woman,'  I  said  to  myself;  but 
nothing  of  that  enthusiasm  could  I  -^eel,  which  beauty, 
such  as  I  have  beheld  at  the  lakes,  would  have  been  apt 
to  raise  under  a  similar  misfortune.  One  lady,  not  very 
scrupulous  in  her  embellishments  of  facts,  used  to  tell  an 
anecdote  of  her,  which  I  hope  was  exaggerated.  Some 
friend  of  hers,  (as  she  affirmed,)  in  company  with  a  large 
party,  visited  Buttermere,  within  a  day  or  two  after  that 
upon  which  Hatfield  suffered ;  and  she  protested  that 
Mary  threw  upon  the  table,  with  an  emphatic  gesture,  the 
Carlisle  paper,  containing  an  elaborate  account  of  his 
execution. 

It  is  an  instance  of  Coleridge's  carelessness  —  that  he, 
who  had  as  little  ill-nature  in  his  temper  as  any  person 
whom  I  have  ever  known,  managed,  in  reporting  this 
story  at  the  time  of  its  occurrence,  to  get  himself  hooked 
into  a  personal  quarrel,  which  hung  over  his  head  unset- 
tled for  nine  or  ten  years.  A  Liverpool  merchant,  who 
was  then  meditating  a  house  in  the  vale  of  Grasmere, 
and  perhaps  might  have  incurred  Coleridge's  anger,  by 
thus  disturbing,  with  inappropriate  intrusions,  this  loveliest 
of  all  English  landscapes,  had  connected  himself  a  good 
deal  with  Hatfield  during  his  Keswick  masquerade :  and 
was  said  even  to  have  carried  his  regard  to  that  villain  so 
%x  as  to  have  christened  one  of  his  own  children  by  the 
uames  of  '  Augustus  Hope.'    With  these  and  other  cir* 


208 


LITERAKY  BEMINISCENCES. 


cumstances,  expressing  the  extent  of  tne  infatuation 
amongst  the  swindler's  dupes,  Coleridge  made  the  pub- 
lic merry.  Naturally  the  Liverpool  merchant  was  not 
amongst  those  who  admired  the  facetiousness  of  Coleridge 
on  this  occasion,  but  swore  vengeance  whenever  they 
should  meet.  They  never  did  meet,  until  ten  years  had 
gone  by,  and  then,  oddly  enough,  it  was  in  the  Liverpool 
man's  own  house  —  that  very  nuisance  of  a  house  which 
had,  I  suppose,  first  armed  Coleridge's  wrath  against  him. 
This  house,  by  time  and  accident,  in  no  very  wonderful 
way^  had  passed  into  the  hands  of  Wordsworth  as  tenant 
Coleridge,  as  was  still  less  wonderful,  had  become  the 
visitor  of  Wordsworth  on  returning  from  Malta ;  and  the 
Liverpool  merchant,  as  was  also  natural,  either  seeking 
his  rent,  or  for  what  other  purpose  I  know  not,  calling 
upon  Wordsworth,  met  Coleridge  in  the  hall.  Now  came 
the  hour  for  settling  old  accounts.  I  was  present,  and  can 
report  the  case.  Both  looked  grave,  and  colored  a  little. 
But  Coleridge,  requesting  his  enemy's  company  in  the 
garden,  entered  upon  a  long  metaphysical  dissertation, 
which  was  rather  puzzling  to  answer.  It  seemed  to  be  an 
expansion,  by  Thomas  Aquinas,  of  that  parody  upon  a 
well  known  passage  in  Shenstone,  where  the  writer  says  — 

« He  kicked  me  down  stairs  with  such  a  sweet  grace. 
That  I  thought  he  was  handing  me  up.* 

And  in  the  upshot  it  clearly  made  it  appear  that,  purely 
on  principles  of  good  neighborhood,  and  universal  philan- 
thropy, could  Coleridge  have  meditated  or  executed  the 
insult  offered  in  the  Morning  Post.  The  Liverpool  mer- 
chant rubbed  his  forehead,  and  seemed  a  little  perplexed  ; 
but  at  length,  considering,  perhaps,  how  very  like  Duns 
Scotus,  or  Albertus  Magnus,  Coleridge  had  shown  himself 
n  this  luminous  explanation,  he  began  to  reflect,  that  had 


SAMUEL  TAYLOR  COLERIDGE. 


209 


any  one  of  those  distinguished  men  offered  a  similar 
affront,  it  would  have  been  impossible  to  resent  it ;  for 
who  could  think  ol  caning  the  seraphic  doctor  ?  or  would 
it  tell  to  any  man's  advantage  in  history  that  he  had  kicked 
Thomas  Aquinas?  On  these  principles,  therefore,  with- 
out saying  one  word,  he  held  out  his  hand,  and  a  lasting 
reconciliation  followed. 

Not  very  long,  I  believe  after  this  affair  of  Hatfield, 
Coleridge  went  to  Malta.  His  inducement  to  such  a  step 
must  have  been  merely  a  desire  to  see  the  most  interest- 
ing regions  of  the  Mediterranean,  under  the  shelter  and 
advantageous  introduction  of  an  official  station.  It  was, 
however,  an  unfortunate  chapter  of  his  life  :  for  being 
necessarily  thrown  a  good  deal  upon  his  own  resources  in 
the  narrow  society  of  a  garrison,  he  there  confirmed  and 
cherished,  if  he  did  not  there  form,  his  habit  of  taking 
opium  in  large  quantities.  I  am  the  last  person  in  the 
world  to  press  conclusions  harshly  or  uncandidly  against 
Coleridge ;  but  I  believe  it  to  be  notorious  that  he  first 
began  the  use  of  opium,  not  as  a  relief  from  any  bodily 
pains  or  nervous  irritations  —  for  his  constitution  was 
strong  and  excellent  ~  but  as  a  source  of  luxurious  sensa- 
tions. It  is  a  great  misfortune,  at  least  it  is  a  great  peril, 
to  have  tasted  the  enchanted  cup  of  youthful  rapture 
incident  to  the  poetic  temperament.  That  standard  of 
high-wrought  sensibility  once  made  known  experiment- 
ally, it  is  rare  to  see  a  submission  afterwards  to  the 
sobrieties  of  daily  life.  Coleridge,  to  speak  in  the  words 
of  Cervantes,  wanted  better  bread  than  was  made  of 
wheat ;  and  w^hen  youthful  blood  no  longer  sustained  the 
riot  of  his  animal  spirits,  he  endeavored  to  excite  them  by 
artificial  stimulants. 

At  Malta  he  became  acquainted  with  Commodore 
Decatur  and  other  Americans  of  distinction;  and  this 
14 


210 


1.ITERAIIY  REMINISCENCES. 


Drought  him  afterwards  into  connection  with  Allston  the 
American  artist.  Of  Sir  Alexander  Ball,  one  of  Lord 
Nelson's  captains  in  the  battle  of  the  Nile,  and  now 
Governor  of  Malta,  he,  spoke  and  wrote  uniformly  in  a 
lavish  style  of  panegyric,  for  which  plainer  men  found 
it  difficult  to  see  the  slightest  ground.  It  was,  indeed, 
Coleridge's  amiable  infirmity  to  project  his  own  mind, 
and  his  own  very  peculiar  ideas,  nay,  even  his  own 
expressions  and  illustrative  metaphors,  upon  other  men, 
and  to  contemplate  these  reflex  images  from  himself,  as 
so  many  characters  having  an  absolute  ground  in  some 
separate  object.    Ball  and  Bell  ^  were  two  of  these  pet 

*  *  Ball  and  Bell '  —  *  Bell  and  Ball : '  —  viz.  Sir  Alexander 
Ball,  Governor  of'  Malta,  and  Dr.  Andrew  Bell,  the  importer  into 
England  from  Madras  of  that  machinery  for  facilitating  popular 
education,  which  was  afterwards  fraudulently  appropriated  by  Joseph 
Lancaster.  The  Bishop  of  Durham  (Shute  Barrington)  gave  to  Dr. 
Bell,  in  reward  of  his  Madras  services,  the  princely  Mastership  of 
Sherborne  Hospital.  The  doctor  saved,  in  this  post,  £125,000,  and 
with  this  money  founded  Trinity  College,  Glenalmond,  in  Perthshire. 
Most  men  have  their  enemies  and  calumniators  :  Dr.  Bell  had  his, 
who  happened  rather  indecorously  to  be  his  wife  —  from  whom  he 
was  legally  separated,  or  (as  in  Scotch  law  it  is  called)  divorced ; 
not,  of  course,  divorced  a  vinculo  matrimonii  (which  only  amounts 
to  a  divorce  in  the  English  sense  —  such  a  divorce  as  enables  the 
parties  to  contract  another  marriage) ,  but  simply  divorced  a  mensd 
et  thoro.  This  legal  separation,  however,  did  not  prevent  the  lady 
from  persecuting  the  unhappy  doctor  with  everlasting  letters, 
indorsed  outside  with  records  of  her  enmity  and  spite.  Sometimes 
she  addressed  her  epistles  thus  :  —  *  To  that  supreme  of  rogues,  who 
looks  the  hang-dog  that  he  is.  Doctor  (such  a  doctor  !)  Andrew 
Bell.'  Or  again:  — *  To  the  ape  of  apes,  and  the  knave  of  knaves, 
who  is  recorded  to  have  once  paid  a  debt  —  but  a  small  one,  you  may 
be  sure,  it  was  that  he  selected  for  this  wonderful  experiment  —  in, 
fact,  it  was  iJ^d.  Had  it  been  on  the  other  side  of  6d.,  he  must  have 
iied  before  he  could  have  achieved  so  dreadful  a  sacrifice.'  Many 
others,  most  ingeniously  varied  in  the  style  of  abuse,  I  have  heard 


SAMUEL  TAYLOR  COLERIDGE. 


21i 


lubjects;  lie  had  a  *  craze'  about  each  of  them;  and 
to  each  he  ascribed  thoughts  and  words,  to  which,  had 
they  been  put  upon  the  rack,  they  never  would  have 
confessed. 

From  Malta,  on  his  return  homewards,  he  went  to 
Rome  and  Naples.  One  of  the  Cardinals,  he  tells  us, 
warned  him,  by  the  Pope's  wish,  of  some  plot,  set  on  foot 
by  Bonaparte,  for  seizing  him  as  an  anti-Gallican  writer. 
This  statement  was  ridiculed,  by  the  anonymous  assailant 
in  Blackwood^  as  the  very  consummation  of  moon-struck 
vanity  ;  and  it  is  there  compared  to  John  Dennis's  frenzy 
in  retreating  from  the  seacoast,  under  the  belief  that 
Louis  XIV.  had  commissioned  emissaries  to  land  on  the 
English  shore  and  make  a  dash  at  his  person.  But,  after 
all,  the  thing  is  not  so  entirely  improbable.  For  it  is 
certain  that  some  orator  of  the  Opposition  (Charles  Fox, 

rehearsed  by  Coleridge,  Southey,  Lloyd,  &c.  ;  and  one,  in  particular, 
addressed  to  the  doctor,  when  spending  a  summer  at  the  cottage  of 
Robert  Newton,  an  old  soldier,  in  Grasmere,  presented  on  the  back 
two  separate  adjurations,  one  specially  addressed  to  Robert  himself, 
pathetically  urging  him  to  look  sharply  after  the  rent  of  his  lodgings; 
and  the  other  more  generally  addressed  to  the  unfortunate  person  as 
yet  undisclosed  to  the  British  public  (and  in  this  case  turning  out  to 
be  myself),  who  might  be  incautious  enough  to  pay  the  postage  at 
Ambleside.  *  Don't  grant  him  an  hour's  credit,'  she  urged  upon 
the  person  unknown,  *  if  I  had  any  regard  to  my  family.'  *  Cash 
down  !  '  she  wrote  twice  over.  —  "Why  the  doctor  submitted  to  these 
annoyances,  nobody  knew.  Some  said  it  was  mere  indolence  ;  but 
others  held  it  to  be  a  cunning  compromise  with  her  inexorable 
malice.  The  letters  were  certainly  open  to  the  *  public '  eye  ;  but 
3aeantime  the  *  public '  was  a  very  narrow  one  :  the  clerks  in  the 
post-office  had  little  time  for  digesting  such  amenities  of  conjugal 
affection  ;  and  the  chance  bearer  of  the  letters  to  the  doctor  would 
naturally  solve  the  mystery  by  supposing  an  extra  portion  of  mad- 
ness in  the  writer,  rather  than  an  extra  portion  of  knavery  in  the 
reverend  receiver. 


212 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


as  Coleridge  asserts,)  had  pointed  out  all  the  principal 
writers  in  the  Morning  Post,  to  Napoleon's  vengeance, 
by  describing  the  war  as  a  war  '  of  that  journal's  crea- 
tion.' And,  as  to  the  insinuation  that  Napoleon  was 
above  throwing  his  regards  upon  a  simple  writer  of 
political  essays,  that  is  not  only  abundantly  confuted  by 
many  scores  of  analogous  cases,  but  also  is  specially  put 
down  by  a  case  circumstantially  recorded  in  the  second 
tour  to  Paris,  by  the  celebrated  John  Scott.  It  there 
appears,  that,  on  no  other  ground  whatever,  than  that  of 
his  connection  with  the  London  newspaper  press,  some 
friend  of  Mr.  Scott's  had  been  courted  most  assiduously 
by  Napoleon  during  the  hundred  days.  Assuredly, 
Coleridge  deserved,  beyond  all  other  men  that  ever  were 
connected  with  the  daily  press,  to  be  regarded  with 
distinction.  Worlds  of  fine  thinking  lie  buried  in  that 
vast  abyss,  never  to  be  disentombed  or  restored  to  human 
admiration.  Like  the  sea,  it  has  swallowed  treasures 
without  end,  that  no  diving-bell  will  bring  up  again.  But 
nowhere  throughout  its  shoreless  magazines  of  wealth, 
does  there  lie  such  a  bed  of  pearls  confounded  with  the 
rubbish  and  '  purgamenta '  of  ages,  as  in  the  political 
papers  of  Coleridge.  No  more  appreciable  monument 
could  be  raised  to  the  memory  of  Coleridge,  than  a  repub- 
lication of  his  essays  in  the  Morning  Post,  but  still  more 
of  those  afterwards  published  in  the  Courier,  And  here, 
by  the  way,  it  may  be  mentioned,  that  the  sagacity  of 
Coleridge,  as  applied  to  the  signs  of  the  times,  is  illustrated 
by  the  fact,  that,  distinctly  and  solemnly  he  foretold  the 
restoration  of  the  Bourbons,  at  a  period  when  most  people 
viewed  such  an  event  as  the  most  romantic  of  visions,  and 
not  less  chimerical  than  that  '  march  upon  Paris,'  of  Lord 
Hawkesbury's,  which  for  so  many  years  supplied  a  theme 
of  laughter  to  the  Whigs. 


SAMUEL  TAYLOR  COLERIDGJI. 


213 


Why  Coleridge  left  Malta,  is  as  difficult  to  explain  upon 
any  principles  of  ordinary  business,  as  why  he  had  ever 
gone  thither.  The  post  of  secretary,  if  it  imposed  any 
official  attendance  of  a  regular  kind,  or  any  official  corres- 
pondence, must  have  been  but  poorly  filled  by  him  ;  and 
Sir  Alexander  Ball,  if  I  have  collected  his  character  justly, 
was  not  likely  to  accept  the  gorgeous  philosophy  of  Coler- 
idge, as  an  indemnification  for  irregular  performance  of  his 
public  duties.  Perhaps,  therefore,  though  on  the  best 
terms  of  mutual  regard,  they  might  be  mutually  pleased  to 
part.  At  any  rate  they  did  part ;  and  poor  Coleridge 
was  seasick  the  whole  of  his  homeward  (as  he  had  been 
through  the  whole  of  his  outward)  voyage. 

It  was  not  long  after  this  event  that  my  own  introduc- 
tion to  Coleridge  occurred.  At  that  time  some  negotiation 
was  pending  between  him  and  the  Royal  Institution, 
which  ended  in  their  engaging  him  to  deliver  a  course  of 
lectures  on  Poetry  and  the  Fine  Arts,  during  the  ensuing 
winter.  For  this  series  (twelve  or  sixteen,  I  think,)  he 
received  a  sum  of  one  hundred  guineas.  And  consider- 
ing the  slightness  of  the  pains  which  he  bestowed  upon 
them,  he  was  well  remunerated.  I  fear  that  they  did  not 
increase  his  reputation  ;  for  never  did  any  man  treat  his 
audience  with  less  respect,  or  his  task  with  less  careful 
attention.  I  was  in  London  for  part  of  the  time,  and  can 
report  the  circumstances,  having  made  a  point  of  attend- 
ing duly  at  the  appointed  hours.  Coleridge  was  at  that 
time  living  uncomfortably  enough  at  the  Courier  Office, 
in  the  Strand.  In  such  a  situation,  annoyed  by  the  sound 
V)f  feet  passing  his  chamber  door  continually  to  the  print- 
ing rooms  of  this  great  establishment,  and  with  no  gentle 
ministrations  of  female  hands  to  sustain  his  cheerfulness, 
naturally  enough  his  spirits  flagged  ;  and  he  took  more 
than  ordinary  doses  of  opium.    I  called  upon  him  daily, 


214 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


and  pitied  his  forlorn  condition.  There  was  no  bell  in 
the  room,  which  for  many  months  answered  the  double 
purpose  of  bed-room  and  sitting-room.  Consequently, 
I  often  saw  him,  picturesquely  enveloped  in  night-caps, 
surmounted  by  handkerchiefs  indorsed  upon  handker- 
chiefs, shouting  from  the  attics  of  the  Courier  Office, 
down  three  or  four  flights  of  stairs,  to  a  certain  '  Mrs 
Bainbridge,'  his  sole  attendant,  whose  dwelling  was  in 
the  subterranean  regions  of  the  house.  There  did  I 
often  see  the  philosopher,  with  a  most  lugubrious  face, 
invoking  with  all  his  might  this  uncouth  name  of 
'  Bainbridge,'  each  syllable  of  which  he  intonated  with 
long-drawn  emphasis,  in  order  to  overpower  the  hostile 
hubbub  coming  downwards  from  the  press,  and  the  roar 
from  the  Strand,  which  entered  at  all  the  front  windows. 
'  Mrs.  Bainbridge  !  I  say,  Mrs.  Bainbridge ! '  was  the 
perpetual  cry,  until  I  expected  to  hear  the  Strand,  and 
distant  Fleet  Street,  take  up  the  echo  of  '  Bainbridge  !  * 
Thus  unhappily  situated,  he  sank  more  than  ever  under 
the  dominion  of  opium  ;  so  that,  at  two  o'clock,  when  he 
should  have  been  in  attendance  at  the  Royal  Institution, 
he  was  too  often  unable  to  rise  from  bed.  Then  came 
dismissals  of  audience  after  audience  with  pleas  of 
illness  ;  and  on  many  of  his  lecture  days,  I  have  seen 
ill  Albemarle  Street  closed  by  a  *  lock '  of  carriages  filled 
*vith  women  of  distinction,  until  the  servants  of  the 
Institution  or  their  own  footmen  advanced  to  the  carriage 
doors  with  the  intelligence  that  Mr.  Coleridge  had  been 
suddenly  taken  ill.  This  plea,  which  at  first  had  been 
received  with  expressions  of  concern,  repeated  too  often, 
began  to  rouse  disgust.  Some  in  anger,  and  some  in  real 
uncertainty  whether  it  would  not  be  trouble  thrown  away, 
ceased  to  attend.  And  we  that  were  more  constant,  toa 
often  found  reason  to  be  disappointed  with  the  qualitj  of 


SAMUEL  TAYLOR  COLERIDGE. 


215 


nis  lecture.  His  appearance  was  generally  that  of  a 
person  struggling  with  pain  and  overmastering  illness. 
His  lips  were  baked  with  feverish  heat,  and  often  black  in 
color ;  and  in  spite  of  the  water  which  he  continued 
drinking  through  the  whole  course  of  his  lecture,  he  often 
seemed  to  labor  under  an  almost  paralytic  inability  to 
raise  the  upper  jaw  from  the  lower.  In  such  a  state  it  is 
clear  that  nothing  could  save  the  lecture  itself  from 
reflecting  his  own  feebleness  and  exhaustion,  except  the 
advantage  of  having  been  precomposed  in  some  happier 
mood.  But  that  never  happened  :  most  unfortunately  he 
relied  upon  his  extempore  ability  to  carry  him  through. 
Now,  had  he  been  in  spirits,  or  had  he  gathered  animation 
and  kindled  by  his  own  motion,  no  written  lecture  could 
have  been  more  efiectual  than  one  of  his  unpremeditated 
colloquial  harangues.  But  either  he  was  depressed  origi- 
nally below  the  point  from  which  any  re-ascent  was  pos- 
sible, or  else  this  re-action  was  intercepted  by  continual 
disgust,  from  looking  back  upon  his  own  ill  success  ;  for 
assuredly  he  never  once  recovered  that  free  and  eloquent 
movement  of  thought  which  he  could  command  at  any 
time  in  a  private  company.  The  passages  he  read, 
moreover,  in  illustrating  his  doctrines,  were  generally 
unhappily  chosen,  because  chosen  at  hap-hazard,  from 
the  difficulty  of  finding  at  a  moment's  summons,  those 
passages  which  he  had  in  his  eye.  Nor  do  I  remember 
any  that  produced  much  eflect,  except  two  or  three, 
which  I  myself  put  ready  marked  into  his  hands,  among 
the  Metrical  Romances  edited  by  Ritson. 

Generally  speaking,  the  selections  were  as  injudicious 
and  as  inappropriate,  as  they  were  ill  delivered  ;  for 
amongst  Coleridge's  accomplishments  good  reading  was 
not  one  ;  he  had  neither  voice,  nor  management  of  voice. 
This  defect  is  unfortunate  in  a  public  lecturer  ;  for  it  is 


216 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCifiS. 


inconceivable  how  mucli  weight  and  effectual  i,atlios  can 
be  communicated  by  sonorous  depth,  and  melodious 
cadences  of  the  human  voice,  to  sentiments  the  most 
trivial ;  nor,  on  the  other  hand,  how  the  grandest  are 
emasculated  by  a  style  of  reading,  which  fails  in  dis- 
tributing the  lights  and  shadows  of  a  musical  intonation. 
However,  this  defect  chiefly  concerned  the  immediate 
impression  ;  the  most  afflicting  to  a  friend  of  Coleridge's 
was  the  entire  absence  of  his  own  peculiar  and  majestic 
intellect ;  no  heart,  no  soul,  was  in  anything  he  said ;  no 
strength  of  feeling  in  recalling  universal  truths  :  no  power 
of  originality  or  compass  of  moral  relations  in  his  novel- 
ties—  all  was  a  poor  faint  reflection  from  jewels  once 
scattered  in  the  highway  by  himself,  in  the  prodigality  of 
his  early  opulence  —  a  mendicant  dependence  on  the 
alms  dropped  from  his  own  overflowing  treasury  of 
happier  times.  Such  a  collapse,  such  a  quenching  of  the 
eagle's  talons  never  was  seen  before.  And  as  I  returned 
from  one  of  the  most  afflicting  of  these  disappointments, 
I  could  not  but  repeat  to  myself  part  of  that  divine 
chorus,  — 

*  Oh !  dark,  dark,  dark,  dark  ! 

Amid  the  blaze  of  noon 
Irrecoverably  dark,  total  eclipse,'  &c.  &o. 

The  next  opportunity  I  had  of  seeing  Coleridge  was  a 
the  lakes,  in  the  winter  of  1809,  and  up  to  the  autumn  of 
the  following  year.  During  this  period  it  was,  that  he 
carried  on  the  original  publication  of '  The  Fri  \nd  ;  '  and 
for  much  the  greater  part  of  the  time  I  saw  him  daily 
He  lived  as  a  visitor  in  the  house  occupied  by  Mr 
Wordsworth  ;  this  house  was  in  Grasmere  ;  and  in  anothei 
part  of  the  same  vale,  at  a  distance  of  barely  one  mile,  I 
myself  had  a  cottage  and  a  considerable  library.  Many 


SAMUEL   TAYLOR  COLERIDGE. 


217 


of  my  books  being  German,  Coleridge  borrowed  them  in 
great  numbers.  Having  a  general  license  from  me  to 
use  them  as  he  would,  he  was  in  the  habit  of  accumulating 
them  so  largely  at  Allan  Bank,  (the  name  of  Mr.  Words- 
worth's house,)  that  sometimes  as  many  as  five  hundred 
were  absent  at  once  ;  which  I  mention,  in  order  to  notice 
a  practice  of  Coleridge's  indicating  his  very  scrupulous 
honor,  in  what  regarded  the  rights  of  ownership.  Literary 
people  are  not  always  so  strict  in  respecting  property  of 
this  description ;  and  I  know  more  than  one  celebrated 
man,  who  professes  as  a  maxim,  that  he  holds  it  no  duty 
of  honor  to  restore  a  borrowed  book  ;  not  to  speak  of 
many  less  celebrated  persons,  who,  without  openly  pro- 
fessing such  a  principle,  do,  however,  in  fact,  exhibit  a  lax 
morality  in  such  cases.  The  more  honorable  it  was  to 
poor  Coleridge,  who  had  means  so  trifling  of  buying 
books  for  himself  —  that,  to  prevent  my  flocks  from 
mixing,  and  being  confounded  with  the  flocks  already 
folded  at  Allan  Bank,  (his  own  and  Wordsworth's,)  or 
rather  that  they  might  mix  without  danger,  he  duly 
inscribed  my  name  in  the  blank  leaves  of  every  volume ; 
a  fact  which  became  rather  painfully  made  known  to 
me ;  for,  as  he  had  chosen  to  dub  me  Esquire^  many 
years  after  this,  it  cost  myself  and  a  female  friend  some 
weeks  of  labor  to  hunt  out  these  multitudinous  memorials, 
and  to  erase  this  heraldic  addition  —  which  else  had  the 
appearance  to  a  stranger  of  having  been  conferred  by 
myself. 

The  Friend^  in  its  original  publication,  was,  as  a 
pecuniary  speculation,  the  least  judicious,  both  in  its 
objects  and  its  means,  I  have  ever  known.  It  was  printed 
at  Penrith,  a  town  in  Cumberland,  on  the  outer  verge  of 
the  lake  district,  and  pret  isely  twenty-eight  miles  removed 
from  Coleridge's  abode.    This  distance,  enough  of  itself 


218 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


in  all  conscience,  was  at  least  trebled  in  effect  by  the 
interposition  of  Kirkstone,  a  mountain  which  is  scaled  by 
a  carriage  ascent  of  three  miles  long,  and  so  steep  in 
parts,  that,  without  four  horses,  no  solitary  traveller  can 
persuade  the  neighboring  innkeepers  to  carry  him. 
Another  road,  by  way  of  Keswick,  is  subject  to  its  own 
separate  difficulties.  And  thus  in  any  practical  sense,  for 
ease,  for  certainty,  and  for  dispatch,  Liverpool,  nine1;y- 
five  miles  distant,  was  virtually  nearer.  Dublin  even,  or 
Cork,  was  more  eligible.  Yet  in  this  town,  so  situated  as 
I  have  stated,  by  way  of  purchasing  such  intolerable 
difficulties  at  the  highest  price,  Coleridge  was  advised,  and 
actually  persuaded  to  set  up  a  printer,  by  buying  types, 
&c.,  instead  of  resorting  to  some  printer  already  estab- 
lished in  Kendal,  a  large  and  opulent  town,  not  more  than 
eighteen  miles  distant,  and  connected  by  a  daily  post; 
whereas,  between  himself  and  Penrith  there  was  no  post 
at  all.  Building  his  mechanical  arrangements  upon  this 
utter  '  upside-down  '  inversion  of  all  common  sense,  it  is 
not  surprising  (as  *  madness  ruled  the  hour')  that  in  all 
other  circumstances  of  plan  or  execution,  the  work  moved 
by  principles  of  downright  crazy  disregard  to  all  that  a 
judicious  counsel  would  have  suggested.  The  subjects 
were  generally  chosen,  obstinately  in  defiance  of  the 
popular  taste  ;  they  were  treated  in  a  style  which  avowed 
contempt  for  the  popular  models  ;  and  the  plans  adopted 
for  obtaining  payment  were  of  a  nature  to  insure  a 
speedy  bankruptcy  to  the  concern.  Coleridge  had  a  list, 
nobody  could  ever  say  upon  whose  authority  gathered 
together,  of  subscribers.  He  tells  us  himself  that  many 
of  these  renounced  the  work  from  an  early  period ;  and 
some  (as  Lord  Corke)  rebuked  him  for  his  presumption  in 
sending  it  unordered,  but  (as  Coleridge  asserts)  neither 
«^turned  the  copies,  nor  remitted  the  price.    And  even 


SAMUEL  TAYLOR  COLERIDGE. 


219 


those  who  were  conscientious  enough  to  do  this  could  not 
remit  four  or  five  shillings  for  as  many  numbc  ts  without 
putting  Coleridge  to  an  expense  of  treble  postage  at  the 
least.  This  he  complains  of  bitterly  in  his  Biographia 
Literaria,  forgetting  evidently  that  the  evil  was  due 
exclusively  to  his  own  defective  arrangements.  People 
necessarily  sent  their  subscriptions  through  such  channels 
as  were  open  to  them,  or  such  as  were  pointed  out  by 
Coleridge  himself.  It  is  also  utterly  unworthy  of  Coler- 
id^T;e  to  have  taxed,  as  he  does,  many  (or  all,  for  any- 
thing that  appears,)  of  his  subscribers  with  neglecting  to 
pay  at  all.  Probably  nobody  neglected.  And,  on  the 
other  hand,  some,  perhaps,  as  a  most  conscientious 
and  venerable  female  relation  of  my  own,  who  had 
subscribed  merely  to  oblige  me,  and  out  of  a  general 
respect  for  Coleridge's  powers,  though  finding  nothing  to 
suit  her  own  taste :  she,  I  happened  to  know,  paid  three 
times  over,  sending  the  money  through  three  different 
channels  according  to  the  shifting  directions  which 
reached  her.  Managed  as  the  reader  will  collect  from 
these  indications,  the  work  was  going  down-hill  from  the 
first.  It  never  gained  any  accessions  of  new  subscribers  : 
from  what  source,  then,  was  the  continual  dropping  off  of 
names  to  be  supplied  ?  The  printer  became  a  bankrupt : 
Coleridge  was  as  much  in  arrear  with  his  articles,  as  with 
his  lectures  at  the  Eoyal  Institution.  That  he  was  from 
the  very  first ;  but  now  he  was  disgusted  and  desponding  ; 
und  with  No.  28  the  work  came  to  a  final  stop.  Some 
years  after  it  was  recast,  as  the  phrase  was,  and  repub- 
lished. But,  in  fact,  this  recast  was  pretty  nearly  a  new 
work.  The  sole  contributor  to  the  original  work  had 
been  Wordsworth,  who  gave  a  very  valuable  paper  on 
*lie  principles  concerned  in  the  composition  of  Epitaphs  \ 


220 


LITERAKY  EEMINiSCENCES. 


and  Professor  Wilson,  who,  in  conjunction  witli  Mr.  Blaii 
an  early  friend,  then  visiting  at  his  place  on  Windermere, 
wrote  the  letter  signed  Mathetes,  the  reply  to  which  came 
from  Mr.  Wordsworth. 


SAMUEL  TAYLOE  COLEKIDGE. 


CHAPTER  VIII 


SAMUEL  TAYLOR  COLERIDGE 


At  the  Lakes,  and  summoned  abroad  by  scenery  so 
exquisite  —  living,  too,  in  tbe  bosom  of  a  family  endeared 
to  him  by  long  friendship  and  sympathy  the  closest 
with  all  his  propensities  and  tastes  —  Coleridge  (it  may 
be  thought)  could  not  sequester  himself  so  profoundly  as 
at  the  Courier  Office  within  his  own  shell,  or  shut  himself 
out  so  completely  from  that  large  dominion  of  eye  and  ear 
amongst  the  hills,  the  fields,  and  the  woods,  which  once 
he  had  exercised  so  pleasantly  to  himself,  and  with  a 
participation  so  immortal,  through  his  exquisite  poems,  to 
all  generations.  He  was  not  now  reduced  to  depend  upon 
*  Mrs.  Bainbridge,'  but  looked  out  from  his  study  win- 
dows upon  the  sublime  hills  of  Seat  Sandal  and  Arthur's 
Chair,  and  upon  pastoral  cottages  at  their  feet ;  and  all 
around  him,  he  heard  hourly  the  murmurings  of  happy 
life,  the  sound  of  female  voices,  and  the  innocent  laughter 
of  children.  But,  apparently,  he  was  not  happy  himself: 
the  accursed  drug  poisoned  all  natural  pleasure  at  its 
sources  ;  he  burrowed  continually  deeper  into  scholastic 
subtleties  and  metaphysical  abstraction,  and,  like  that 
class  described  by  Seneca,  in  the  luxurious  Rome  of  his 
Jays,  he  lived  chiefly  by  candle-light.  At  two  or  three 
o'clock  in  the  afternoon  he  would  make  his  first  appear- 
ance :  through  the  silence  of  the  night,  when  all  other 


222 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


ligKts  had  long  disappeared,  in  the  quiet  cottage  of  Gras- 
mere  Ms  lamp  might  be  seen  invariably  by  the  belated 
traveller,  as  he  descended  the  long  steep  from  Dun-mail- 
raise  ;  and  at  five  or  six  o'clock  in  the  morning,  when 
man  was  going  forth  to  his  labor,  this  insulated  son  of 
reveries  was  retiring  to  bed. 

Society  he  did  not  much  court,  because  much  was  not 
to  be  had ;  but  he  did  not  shrink  from  any  which  wore  the 
promise  of  novelty.  At  that  time  the  leading  person 
about  the  Lakes,  as  regarded  rank  and  station,  amongst 
those  who  had  any  connection  with  literature,  was  Dr. 
Watson,  the  well-known  Bishop  of  Llandaff.  This  dig- 
nitary I  knew  myself  as  much  as  I  wished  to  know  him, 
having  gone  to  his  house  five  or  six  times  purposely  that  I 
might  know  him :  and  I  shall  speak  of  him  circumstan- 
tially. Those  who  have  read  his  autobiography,  or  are 
otherwise  acquainted  with  the  outline  of  his  career,  will 
be  aware  that  he  was  the  son  of  a  Westmoreland  school- 
master. Going  to  Cambridge,  with  no  great  store  of 
classical  knowledge,  but  with  the  more  common  accom- 
plishment of  Westmoreland  men,  and  one  better  suited  to 
Cambridge,  viz.  —  a  sufiicient  basis  of  mathematics,  and 
a  robust,  though  commonplace  intellect,  for  improving 
his  knowledge  according  to  any  direction  which  accident 
bhould  prescribe  —  he  obtained  the  Professorship  of 
Chemistry  without  one  iota  of  chemical  knowledge  up  to 
the  hour  when  he  gained  it :  and  then  setting  eagerly  to 
work,  that  he  might  not  disgrace  the  choice  which  had 
thus  distinguished  him,  long  before  the  time  arnved  foi 
•commencing  his  prelections,  he  had  made  himself  capable 
of  writing  those  beautiful  essays  on  that  science,  which 
after  a  revolution,  and  a  counter-revolution,  so  great  as 
succeeding  times  have  witnessed,  still  remain  a  cardinal 
book  of  ^introductory  discipline  to  such  studies;  an  opinion 


Samuel  taylor  coleridge. 


223 


authorized  not  only  by  Professor  Thomson  of  Glasgow, 
but  also,  to  myself,  by  the  late  Sir  Humphry  Davy. 
With  this  experimental  proof  that  a  Chemical  Chair  might 
be  won  and  honored  without  previous  knowledge,  even  of 
the  chemical  alphabet,  he  resolved  to  play  the  same  feat 
with  the  Royal  Chair  of  Divinity ;  one  far  more  important 
for  local  honor,  and  for  wealth.  Here  again  he  succeeded : 
and  this  time  he  extended  his  experiment ;  for  whereas 
both  Chairs  had  been  won  without  previous  knowledge,  he 
resolved  that  in  this  case  it  should  be  maintained  without 
after  knowledge.  He  applied  himself  simply  to  the  im- 
provement of  its  income,  which  he  raised  from  £300  to  at 
least  £1000  per  annum.  All  this  he  had  accomplished 
before  reaching  the  age  of  thirty-five. 

Riches  are  with  us  the  parent  of  riches  ;  and  success, 
in  the  hands  of  an  active  man,  is  the  pledge  of  further 
success.  On  the  basis  of  this  Cambridge  preferment,  Dr. 
"Watson  built  upwards,  until  he  had  raised  himself,  in  one 
way  or  other,  to  a  seat  in  the  House  of  Lords,  and  to  a 
commensurate  income.  For  the  latter  half  of  his  life,  he 
—  originally  a  village  schoolmaster's  son  —  was  able  to 
associate  with  the  magnates  of  the  land,  upon  equal  terms. 
And  that  fact,  of  itself,  without  another  word,  implies,  in 
this  country,  a  degree  of  rank  and  fortune  which  one 
would  think  a  sufficient  reward  even  for  merit  as  unques- 
tionable as  was  that  of  Dr.  Watson.  Yet  he  was  always 
a  discontented  man,  and  a  railer  at  the  Government  and 
the  age  which  could  permit  merit  such  as  his  to  pine 
>way  ingloriously,  in  one  of  the  humblest  amongst  the 
bishoprics,  with  no  other  addition  to  its  emoluments  than 
he  richest  Professorship  in  Europe,  and  such  other  acci- 
dents in  life  as  gave  him  in  all,  perhaps,  not  above  seven 
fchousand  per  annum  !  Poor  man  !  —  only  seven  thousand 
t)er  annum  !    What  a  trial  to  a  man's  patience  !  — -  and 


224 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


how  much  he  stood  in  need  of  philosophy,  or  even  of 
religion,  '■o  face  so  dismal  a  condition  ! 

The  Bishop  was  himself,  in  a  secondary  way,  an  in- 
teresting study.  What  I  mean  is,  that,  though  originally 
the  furthest  removed  from  an  interesting  person,  being  a 
man  remarkable  indeed  for  robust  faculties,  but  otherwise 
commonplace  in  his  character,  worldly-minded,  and  coarse, 
even  to  obtuseness,  in  his  sensibilities,  he  yet  became 
interesting  from  the  strength  of  degree  with  which  these 
otherwise  repulsive  characteristics  were  marked.  He  was 
one  of  that  numerous  order  in  whom  even  the  love  of 
knowledge  is  subordinate  to  schemes  of  advancement  ; 
and  to  whom  even  his  own  success,  and  his  own  honor 
consequent  upon  that  success,  had  no  higher  value  than 
according  to  their  use  as  instruments  for  winning  further 
promotion.  Hence  it  was,  that,  when  by  such  aids  he  had 
mounted  to  a  certain  eminence,  beyond  which  he  saw  little 
promise  of  further  ascent,  by  their  assistance  —  since  at 
this  stage  it  was  clear,  that  party  connection  in  politics 
must  become  his  main  reliance  —  he  ceased  to  regard  his 
favorite  sciences  with  much  interest.  Even  chemistry 
was  now  neglected.  This,  above  all,  was  perplexing  to 
one  who  did  not  understand  his  character.  For  hither 
one  would  have  supposed  he  might  have  retreated  from 
his  political  disappointments,  and  have  found  a  perpetual 
consolation  in  honors  which  no  intrigues  could  defeat,  and 
in  the  gratitude,  so  pure  and  untainted,  which  still  attended 
the  honorable  exertions  of  his  youth.  But  he  viewed  the 
natter  in  a  very  different  light.  Other  generations  had 
come  since  then,  and  '  other  palms  were  won.'  To  keep 
pace  with  the  advancing  science,  and  to  maintain  his 
station  amongst  his  youthful  competitors,  would  demand 
a  youthful  vigor  and  motives  such  as  theirs.  But,  as  to 
uimself,  chemistry  had  given  al   it  could  give.  Having 


SAMUEL  TATTOR  COLERIDGE.  225 

first  raised  himself  to  distinction  by  that,  lie  had  since 
married  into  an  ancient  family  —  one  of  the  leaders 
amongst  the  Ian  Jed  aristocracy  of  his  own  county  :  — he 
thus  had  entitled  himself  to  call  the  head  of  that  family 
' —  a  territorial  potentate  with  ten  thousand  per  annum  — 
by  the  contemptuous  sobriquet  of  '  Dull  Daniel ; '  he 
looked  down  upon  numbers  whom,  twenty  years  before, 
he  scarcely  durst  have  looked  up  to  ;  he  had  obtained  a 
bishopric.  Chemistry  had  done  all  this  for  him  ;  and  had, 
besides,  co-operating  with  luck,  put  him  in  the  way  of 
reaping  a  large  estate  from  the  gratitude  and  early  death 
of  a  pupil,  Mr.  Luther.  All  this  chemistry  had  effected  : 
could  chemistry  do  anything  more  ?  Clearly  not.  And 
here  it  was,  that,  having  lost  his  motives  for  cultivating  it 
farther,  he  regarded  the  present  improvers  of  the  science, 
not  with  the  feelings  natural  to  a  disinterested  lover  of 
such  studies  on  their  own  account,  but  with  jealousy,  as 
men  who  had  edipsed  or  had  bedimmed  his  own  once 
brilliant  reputation.  Two  revolutions  had  occurred  since 
his  own  *  palmy  days  ; '  Sir  Humphry  Davy  might  be 
right ;  and  all  might  be  gold  that  glistened  ;  but,  for  his 
part,  he  was  too  old  to  learn  new  theories  —  he  must  be 
content  to  hobble  to  his  grave  with  such  old-fashioned 
creeds  as  had  answered  in  his  time,  when,  for  aught  he 
could  see,  men  prospered  as  much  as  in  this  new-fangled 
world.  This  was  the  tone  of  his  ordinary  talk  ;  and,  in 
one  sense  —  as  regards  personal  claims,  I  mean  —  it  was 
illiberal  enough  ;  for  the  leaders  of  modern  chemistry 
never  overlooked  his  claims.  Professor  Thomson,  of 
Glasgow,  always  spoke  of  his  '  Essays  '  as  of  a  book 
which  hardly  any  revolution  could  antiquate  ;  and  Sir 
Humphry  Davy,  in  reply  to  a  question  which  I  put  to 
him  upon  that  point,  in  1813,  declared  that  he  knew  of 
no  book  better  qualified,  as  one  of  introductory  discipline 
15 


226 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


to  the  youthful  experimenter,  or  as  an  apprenticebJiip  to 
the  taste  in  elegant  selection  of  topics. 

Yet  querulous  and  discontented  as  the  Bishop  was, 
when  he  adverted  either  to  chemistry  or  to  his  own  posi- 
tion in  life,  the  reader  must  not  imagine  to  himself  the 
ordinary  '  complement '  and  appurtenances  of  that  char- 
acter — such  as  moroseness,  illiberality  or  stinted  hospi- 
talities. On  the  contrary,  his  Lordship  was  a  joyous,  jovial, 
and  cordial  host.  He  was  pleasant,  and  even  kind  in  his 
manners  ;  most  hospitable  in  his  reception  of  strangers,  no 
matter  of  what  party  ;  and  I  must  say  that  he  was  as  little 
overbearing  in  argument,  and  as  little  stood  upon  his 
privilege  as  a  church  dignitary,  as  any  '  big  wig  '  I  have 
happened  to  know.  He  was  somewhat  pompous,  un- 
doubtedly ;  but  that,  in  an  old  academic  hero,  was  rather 
agreeable,  and  had  a  characteristic  effect.  He  listened 
patiently  to  all  your  objections  ;  and,  though  steeped  to 
the  lips  in  prejudice,  he  was  really  candid.  I  mean  to  say, 
that  although,  generally  speaking,  the  unconscious  pre- 
occupation of  his  understanding  shut  up  all  avenues  to  new 
convictions,  he  yet  did  his  best  to  open  his  mind  to  any 
views  that  might  be  presented  at  the  moment.  And,  with 
regard  to  his  querulous  egotism,  though  it  may  appear 
laughable  enough  to  all  who  contrast  his  real  pretensions 
with  their  public  appreciation,  as  expressed  in  his  acquired 
opulence  and  rank ;  and  who  contrast,  also,  his  case  with 
that  of  other  men  in  his  own  profession  —  such  as  Paley 
for  example  —  yet  it  cannot  be  denied  that  fortune  had 
crossed  his  path,  latterly,  with  foul  winds,  no  less  strikingly 
than  his  early  life  had  been  seconded  by  her  favoring 
gales.    In  particular.  Lord  Holland"^'  mentioned  to  a  friend 

*  It  was  Lady  Holland.  I  know  not  how  I  came  to  make  such  a 
mistake.   And  the  friend  was  Wordsworth. 


SAMUEL  TAYLOR  COLERIDGE. 


227 


of  my  own  the  following  anecdote  :  — '  What  you  say  of 
the  Bishop  may  be  very  true  :  [they  were  riding  past  his 
grounds  at  the  time,  which  had  turned  the  conversation 
upon  his  character  and  public  claims  :]  but  to  us  [Lord 
Holland  meant  to  the  Whig  party]  he  was  truly  honorable 
and  faithful ;  insomuch,  that  my  uncle  had  agreed  with 
Lord  Granville  to  make  him  Archbishop  of  York,  sede 
vacante ;  —  all  was  settled  ;  and  had  we  staid  in  power  a 
little  longer,  he  would,  beyond  a  doubt,  have  had  that 
dignity.' 

Now,  if  the  reader  happens  to  recollect  how  soon  the 
death  of  Dr.  Markham  followed  the  sudden  dissolution  of 
that  short-lived  administration  in  1807,  he  will  see  how 
narrowly  Dr.  Watson  missed  this  elevation  ;  and  one  must 
allow  for  a  little  occasional  spleen  under  such  circum- 
stances. Yet,  what  an  archbishop  !  He  talked  openly,  at 
his  own  table,  as  a  Socinian  ;  ridiculed  the  miracles  of  the 
New  Testament,  which  he  professed  to  explain  as  so  many 
chemical  tricks,  or  cases  of  politic  legerdemain  ;  and  cer- 
tainly had  as  little  of  devotional  feeling  as  any  man  that 
ever  lived.  It  is,  by  comparison,  a  matter  of  little  con- 
sequence, that,  in  her  spiritual  integrity  so  little  regarding 
the  church  of  which  he  called  himself  a  member,  he 
should,  in  her  temporal  interests,  have  been  ready  to  lay 
her  open  to  any  assaults  from  almost  any  quarter.  He 
could  naturally  have  little  reverence  for  the  rights  of  the 
shepherds,  having  so  little  for  the  pastoral  office  itself,  or 
for  the  manifold  duties  it  imposes.  All  his  public,  all  his 
professional  duties,  he  systematically  neglected.  He  was 
a  Lord  in  Parliament,  and  for  many  a  year  he  never 
attended  in  his  place  :  he  was  a  Bishop,  and  he  scarcely 
fcnew  any  part  of  his  diocese  by  sight  —  living  three 
tiundred  miles  away  from  it :  he  was  a  Professor  of  Di- 
finity ;  he  held  the  richest  Professorship  in  Europe,  the 


228 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


weightiest,  for  its  functions,  in  England,  —  he  drew,  by 
his  own  admission,  one  thousand  per  annum  from  its 
endowments,  (deducting  some  stipend  to  his  locum  ienens 
at  Cambridge;)  and  for  thirty  years  he  never  read  a  lec- 
ture, or  performed  a  public  exercise.  Spheres  how  vast 
of  usefulness  to  a  man  as  able  as  himself!  —  subjects  of 
what  bitter  anguish  on  the  death-bed  of  one  who  had 
been  tenderly  alive  to  his  own  duties  !  In  his  political 
purism,  and  the  unconscious  partisanship  of  his  consti- 
tutional scruples,  he  was  a  true  Whig,  and  thoroughly 
diverting.  That  Lord  Lonsdale  or  that  the  Duke  of 
Northumberland  should  interfere  with  elections,  that  he 
thought  scandalous  and  awful ;  but  that  a  Lord  of  the 
house  of  Cavendish  or  Howard,  a  Duke  of  Devonshire  or 
Norfolk,  or  an  Earl  of  Carlisle,  should  traffic  in  boroughs, 
or  exert  the  most  despotic  influence  as  landlords  mutato 
nomine,  he  viewed  as  the  mere  natural  right  of  property  : 
and  so  far  was  he  from  loving  the  pure-hearted  and  unfac- 
tious  champions  of  liberty,  that,  in  one  of  his  printed 
works,  he  dared  to  tax  Milton  with  having  knowingly, 
wilfully,  deliberately  told  a  falsehood.^ 

Coleridge,  it  was  hardly  possible,  could  reverence  a 
man  like  this  :  —  ordinary  men  might,  because  they  were 
told  that  he  had  defended  Christianity  against  the  vile 
blasphemers  and  impotent  theomichrists  of  the  day.  But 
Coleridge  had  too  pure  an  ideal  of  a  Christian  philosopher, 
derived  from  the  age  of  the  English  Titans  in  theology, 
to  share  in  that  estimate.  It  is  singular  enough,  and  inter- 
esting to  a  man  who  has  ever  heard  Coleridge  talk,  but 
especially  to  one  who  has  assisted  (to  speak  in  French 

*  This  supposed  falsehood  respected  the  sect  called  Brownists,  and 
occurs  in  the  *  Defensis  pro  Pop.  Anglicano.'  The  whole  charge  is  a 
blunder,  and  rests  upon  the  Bishop's  own  imperfect  knowledge  of 
Latinity. 


SAMUEL  TAYLOR  COLERIDGE. 


229 


phrase)  at  a  talking  party  between  Coleridge  and  the 
Bishop,  to  look  back  upon  an  article  in  the  Quarterly 
Review^  ^\'here,  in  conection  with  the  Bishop's  auto- 
biography, some  sneers  are  dropped  with  regard  to  the 
intellectual  character  of  the  neighborhood  in  which  he  had 
settled.  I  have  been  told,  on  pretty  good  authority,  that 
this  article  was  written  by  the  late  Dr.  Whittaker,  of 
Craven,  the  topographical  antiquarian  ;  a  pretty  sort  of 
person,  doubtless,  to  assume  such  a  tone,  in  speaking  of  a 
neighborhood  so  dazzling  in  its  intellectual  pretensions, 
as  that  region  at  that  time ! 

The  Bishop  had  fixed  his  abode  on  the  banks  of  Win- 
dermere. In  a  small  but  beautiful  park,  he  had  himself 
raised  a  plain,  but  handsome  and  substantial  mansion  : 
Calgarth,  or  Calgarth  Park,  was  its  name.  Now,  at  Kes- 
wick lived  Mr.  Southey  ;  twenty  miles  distant,  it  is  true, 
but  still,  for  a  bishop  with  a  bishop's  equipage,  not  beyond 
a  morning's  drive.  At  Grasmere,  about  eight  miles  from 
Calgarth,  were  to  be  found  Wordsworth  and  Coleridge. 
At  Brathay,  about  four  miles  from  Calgarth,  lived  Charles 
Lloyd  ;  and  he,  far  as  he  was  below  the  others  I  have 
mentioned,  could  not  in  candor  be  considered  a  common 
man.  He  w^as  somewhat  too  Rousseauish  ;  but  he  had, 
in  conversation,  very  extraordinary  powers  for  analysis  of 
a  certain  kind,  applied  to  the  philosophy  of  manners,  and 
the  most  delicate  nuances  of  social  life  ;  and  his  translation 
of '  Alfier:,'  together  with  his  own  poems,  shows  him  to 
have  been  an  accomplished  scholar.  Then,  not  much 
above  a  mile  from  Calgarth,  at  his  beautiful  creation  of 
EUeray,  lived  Professor  Wilson,  of  whom  I  need  not 
speak.  He,  in  fact,  and  Mr  Lloyd,  were  on  the  most 
intimate  terms  with  the  Bishop's  family.  The  meanest  of 
these  persons  was  able  to  have  '  taken  the  conceit '  out  of 
Mr.  Dr.  Whittaker,  and  all  his  tribe.    But  even  in  the 


230 


LITE^lARY  REMINISCENCES. 


town  of  Kendal,  about  nine  miles  from  Calgarth,  there 
were  many  men  of  information,  at  least  as  extensive  as 
Dr.  Watson's,  and  amply  qualified  to  have  met  him 
upon  equal  terms  in  conversation.  Mathematics,  it  is  well 
known,  are  extensively  cultivated  in  the  north  of  Eng- 
land. Sedburgh,  for  many  years,  was  a  sort  of  nursery, 
or  rural  Chapel-of-ease,  to  Cambridge.  Gough,  the  blind 
mathematician  and  botanist  of  Kendal,  was  known  to 
fame ;  but  many  others  in  that  town  had  accomplish- 
ments equal  to  his ;  and,  indeed,  so  widely  has  mathe- 
matical knowledge  extended  itself  throughout  Northern 
England,  that  even  amongst  the  poor  weavers,  mechanic 
laborers  for  their  daily  bread,  the  cultivation  of  the  geo- 
metrical analysis,  in  the  most  refined  shape,  has  long 
prevailed ;  of  which  some  accounts  have  been  recently 
published.  Some  local  pique,  therefore,  must  have  been 
at  the  bottom  of  Dr.  Whittaker's  sneer.  At  all  events,  it 
was  ludicrously  contrasted  with  the  true  state  of  the  case, 
as  brought  out  by  the  meeting  between  Coleridge  and  the 
Bishop. 

Coleridge  was  armed,  at  all  points,  with  the  scholastic 
erudition  which  bore  upon  all  questions  that  could  arise 
in  polemic  divinity.  The  philosophy  of  ancient  Greece, 
through  all  its  schools,  the  philosophy  of  the  Schoolmen, 
technically  so  called,  church  history,  &c.,  Coleridge  had 
within  his  call.  Having  been  personally  acquainted,  or 
connected  as  a  pupil,  with  Eichhorn  and  Michaelis,  he 
knew  the  whole  cycle  of  schisms  and  audacious  specula- 
tions, through  which  Biblical  criticism,  or  Christian  phi- 
losophy, has  revolved  in  Modern  Germany.  All  this  was 
ground  upon  which  the  Bishop  of  Llandafi*  trode  with  the 
infirm  footing  of  a  child.  He  listened  to  what  Coleridge 
.'deported  with  the  same  sort  of  pleasurable  surprise,  alter- 
uating  with  starts  of  doubt  or  incredulity,  as  would  natu* 


SAMUi:L  TAYLOR  COLEHIDGE. 


231 


rally  attend  a  detailed  report  from  Laputa,  —  which  aerial 
region  of  speculation  does  but  too  often  recur  to  a  sober- 
minded  person,  in  reading  of  the  endless  freaks  in  philoso- 
phy of  modern  Germany,  where  the  sceptre  of  Mutability, 
the  potentate  celebrated  by  Spenser,  gathers  more  trophies 
in  a  year,  than  elsewhere  in  a  century ;  '  the  anarchy  of 
dreams  *  presiding  in  her  philosophy ;  and  the  restless 
elements  of  opinion,  throughout  every  region  of  debate, 
moulding  themselves  eternally,  like  the  billowy  sands  of 
the  desert,  as  beheld  by  Bruce,  into  towering  columns, 
that  soar  upwards  to  a  giddy  altitude,  then  stalk  about  for 
a  minute,  all  a-glow  with  fiery  color,  and  finally  unmould 
and  '  dislimn,'  with  a  collapse  as  sudden  as  the  motions  of 
that  eddying  breeze,  under  which  their  vapory  architecture 
arose.  Hartley  and  Locke,  both  of  whom  the  Bishop 
made  into  idols,  were  discussed ;  especially  the  former, 
against  whom  Coleridge  alleged  some  of  those  arguments 
which  he  has  used  in  his  Biographia  Liter  aria.  The 
Bishop  made  but  a  feeble  defence ;  and,  upon  some 
points,  none  at  all.  He  seemed,  I  remember,  much 
struck  with  one  remark  of  Coleridge's  to  this  effect :  — 
'  That,  whereas  Hartley  fancied  that  our  very  reasoning 
was  an  aggregation,  collected  together  under  the  law  of 
association ;  on  the  contrary,  we  reason  by  counteracting 
that  law, — just,  said  he,  as  in  leaping,  the  law  of  gravi- 
tation concurs  to  that  act  in  its  latter  part ;  but  no  leap 
could  take  place  were  it  not  by  a  counteraction  of  the 
law.'  One  remark  of  the  Bishop's  let  me  into  the  secret 
of  his  very  limited  reading.  Coleridge  had  used  the  word 
'  apperception  ; '  —  apparently  without  intention  ;  for,  on 
\earing  some  objection  to  the  word,  as  being  'surely  not 
a  word  that  Addison  would  have  used,'  he  silently  substi- 
tuted another  word.  Some  months  afterwards,  going  with 
Charles  Lloyd  to  call  at  Calgarth,  during  the  time  when 


232 


IITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


The  Friend  was  appearing,  the  Bishop  again  noticed  thig 
obnoxious  word,  and  in  the  very  same  terms :  — '  Now, 
this  word  apperception,  which  Mr.  Coleridge  uses  in  the 
last  number  of  The  Friend,  surely,  surely  it  would  not 
have  been  approved  by  Addison ;  no,  Mr.  Lloyd,  nor  by 
Swift ;  nor  even,  I  think,  by  Arbuthnot.'  Somebody  sug- 
gested that  the  word  was  a  new  word  of  German  mintage, 
and  most  probably  due  to  Kant  —  of  whom  the  Bishop 
seemed  never  to  have  heard.  Meantime  the  fact  was, 
and  to  me  an  amusing  one,  that  the  word  had  been  com- 
monly used  by  Leibnitz  —  who  is  really  a  classical  author 
on  such  subjects. 

In  the  autumn  of  1810,  Coleridge  left  the  Lakes;  and 
—  so  far  as  I  am  aware  —  for  ever.  I  once,  indeed, 
heard  a  rumor  of  his  having  passed  through  with  some 
party  of  tourists  —  some  reason  struck  me,  at  the  time, 
for  believing  it  untrue  —  but,  at  all  events,  he  never  re- 
turned to  them  as  a  resident.  What  might  be  his  reason 
for  this  eternal  self-banishment  from  scenes  which  he  so 
well  understood  in  all  their  shifting  forms  of  beauty,  I  can 
only  guess.  Perhaps  it  was  the  very  opposite  reason  to 
that  which  is  most  obvious :  not  possibly  because  he  had 
become  indifferent  to  their  attractions,  but  because  his 
undecaying  sensibility  to  their  commanding  power,  had 
become  associated  with  too  afflicting  remembrances,  and 
flashes  of  personal  recollections,  suddenly  restored  and 
illuminated  —  recollections  which  will 

*  Sometimes  leap 
From  hiding  places  ten  years  deep,* 

and  bring  into  collision  the  present  with  some  long- 
forgotten  past,  in  a  form  too  trying  and  too  painful  foi 
endurance.  I  have  a  brilliant  Scotch  friend,  who  cannot 
firalk  on  the    seashore  —  within  sight  of  its  avtjyot&pLOf 


SAMTTEI,  TAYLOR  COLERIDGi:. 


233 


ye^aa^au  the  multitudinous  laughter  of  its  waves,  or  within 
hearing  of  its  resounding  uproar,  because  they  bring  up, 
by  links  of  old  association,  too  insupportably  to  his  mind, 
the  agitations  of  his  glittering,  but  too  fervid  youth.  There 
is  a  feeling  —  morbid  it  may  be,  but  for  which  no  ano- 
dyne is  found  in  all  the  schools  from  Plato  to  Kant  —  to 
which  the  human  mind  is  liable  at  times :  it  is  best  de- 
scribed in  a  little  piece  by  Henry  More,  the  Platonist.  He 
there  represents  himself  as  a  martyr  to  his  own  too  pas- 
sionate sense  of  beauty,  and  his  consequent  too  passionate 
sense  of  its  decay.  Everywhere  —  above,  below,  around 
him,  in  the  earth,  in  the  clouds,  in  the  fields,  and  in  their 
'garniture  of  flowers' — he  beholds  a  beauty  carried  to 
excess;  and  this  beauty  becomes  a  source  of  endless 
affliction  to  him,  because  everywhere  he  sees  it  liable  to 
the  touch  of  decay  and  mortal  change.  During  one 
paroxysm  of  this  sad  passion,  an  angel  appears  to  comfort 
him ;  and,  by  the  sudden  revelation  of  her  immortal  beau- 
ty, does,  in  fact,  suspend  his  grief.  But  it  is  only  a  sus- 
pension; for  the  sudden  recollection  that  her  privileged 
condition,  and  her  exemption  from  the  general  fate  of  beau- 
ty, is  only  by  way  of  exception  to  a  universal  rule,  restores 
his  grief:  '  And  thou  thyself,'  he  says  to  the  angel,  — 

*  And  thou  thyself,  that  com'st  to  comfort  me, 
Wouldst  strong  occasion  of  deep  sorrow  bring, 
If  thou  wert  subject  to  mortality  ! ' 

Every  man,  who  has  ever  dwelt  with  passionate  love  upon 
the  fair  face  of  some  female  companion  through  life, 
must  have  had  the  same  feeling ;  and  must  often,  in  the 
exquisite  language  of  Shakspeare's  sonnets,  have  com- 
mended and  adjured  all-conquering  Time,  there,  at  least, 
ind  upon  that  one  tablet  of  his  adoration, 

•  To  write  no  wrinkle  with  his  antique  hand.  * 


234 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


Vain  prayer  !  Empty  adjuration  !  Profitless  rebellioD 
against  the  laws  which  season  all  things  for  the  inexorable 
grave  !  Yet  not  the  less  we  rebel  again  and  again ;  and, 
though  wisdom  counsels  resignation  and  submission,  yet, 
our  human  passions,  still  cleaving  to  their  object,  force  us 
into  endless  rebellion.  Feelings,  the  same  in  kind  as 
these,  attach  themselves  to  our  mental  powers,  and  our 
vital  energies.  Phantoms  of  lost  power,  sudden  intuitions, 
and  shadowy  restorations  of  forgotten  feelings,  sometimes 
dim  and  perplexing,  sometimes  by  bright  but  furtive 
glimpses,  sometimes  by  a  full  and  steady  revelation, 
overcharged  with  light  —  throw  us  back  in  a  moment 
upon  scenes  and  remembrances  that  we  have  left  full 
thirty  years  behind  us.  In  solitude,  and  chiefly  in  the 
b'olitudes  of  nature ;  and,  above  all,  amongst  the  great 
and  enduring  features  of  nature,  such  as  mountains  and 
quiet  dells,  and  the  lawny  recesses  of  forests,  and  the 
silent  shores  of  lakes,  features  with  which  (as  being 
themselves  less  liable  to  change)  our  feelings  have  a 
more  abiding  association  —  under  these  circumstances  it 
is,  that  such  evanescent  hauntings  of  our  past  and  for- 
gotten selves  are  most  apt  to  startle  and  to  waylay  us. 
These  are  positive  torments  from  which  the  agitated 
mind  shrinks  in  fear ;  but  there  are  others  negative  in 
their  nature,  that  is,  blank  mementoes  of  power  extinct, 
and  of  faculties  burnt  out  within  us.  And  from  both 
forms  of  anguish  —  from  this  twofold  scourge  —  poor 
Coleridge  fled,  perhaps,  in  flying  from  the  beauty  of 
external  nature.  In  alluding  to  this  latter,  or  negative 
form  of  suflering — that  form,  I  mean,  which  presents 
not  the  too  fugitive  glimpses  of  past  power,  but  its  blank 
annihilation  —  Coleridge  himself  most  beautifully  insists 
upon,  and  illustrates  the  truth,  that  all  which  we  find  Id 
Vature  must  be  created  by  ourselves ;  and  that  alike 


SAMUEL  TAYLOR  COLERIDGE. 


235 


whether  Nature  is  so  gorgeous  in  her  beauty  as  to  seem 
apparelled  in  her  wedding  garment,  or  so  powerless  and 
extinct  as  to  seem  palled  in  her  shroud  —  in  either  case, 

*  0,  Lady  !  we  receive  but  what  we  give. 
And  in  our  life  alone  does  nature  live  : 
Ours  is  her  wedding  garment,  ours,  her  shroud. 

*  It  were  a  vain  endeavor, 
Though  I  should  gaze  forever 
On  that  green  light  that  lingers  in  the  west : 
I  may  not  hope  from  outward  forms  to  win 
The  passion  and  the  life  whose  fountains  are  within*  * 

This  was  one,  and  the  most  common  shape  of  ex- 
tinguished power,  from  which  Coleridge  fled  to  the  great 
city.  Bat  sometimes  the  same  decay  came  back  upon 
his  heart  in  the  more  poignant  shape  of  intimations,  and 
vanishing  glimpses,  recovered  for  one  moment  from  the 
paradise  of  youth,  and  from  the  fields  of  joy  and  power, 
over  which  for  him,  too  certainly,  he  felt  that  the  cloud 
of  night  had  settled  for  ever.  Both  modes  of  the  same 
torment  exiled  him  from  nature  ;  and  for  the  same  reason 
he  fled  from  poetry  and  all  commerce  with  his  own  soul ; 
burying  himself  in  the  profoundest  abstractions,  from  life 
and  human  sensibilities. 

*  For  not  to  think  of  what  I  needs  must  feel. 
But  to  be  still  and  patient  all  I  can ; 
And  haply  by  abstruse  research  to  steal. 

From  my  own  nature,  all  the  natural  man  : 
This  was  my  sole  resource,  my  only  plan; 
Till  that  which  suits  a  part,  infects  the  whole. 
And  now  is  almost  grown  the  habit  of  my  soul.' 

Such  were,  doubtless,  the  true  and  radical  causes, 
which,  for  the  final  twenty-four  years  of  Coleridge's  life, 
drew  him  away  from  those  scenes  of  natural  beauty  in 
which  only,  at  an  earlier  stage  of  life,  he  found  strength 


236 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


and  restoration.  These  were  the  causes  ;  but  the  imme- 
diate occasion  of  his  departure  from  the  Lakes,  in  the 
autumn  of  1800,  was  the  favorable  opportunity  then 
presented  to  him  of  migrating  in  a  pleasant  way.  Mr. 
Basil  Montagu,  the  Chancery  barrister,  happened  at  that 
time  to  be  returning  to  London  with  Mrs.  Montagu,  from 
a  visit  to  the  Lakes,  or  to  Wordsworth.  His  travelling 
carriage  was  roomy  enough  to  allow  of  his  offering 
Coleridge  a  seat  in  it ;  and  his  admiration  of  Coleridge 
was  just  then  fervent  enough  to  prompt  a  friendly  wish 
for  that  sort  of  close  connection  —  viz.  by  domestication 
as  a  guest  under  Mr.  Basil  Montagu's  roof — which  is 
the  most  trying  to  friendship,  and  which,  in  this  instance, 
led  to  a  perpetual  rupture  of  it.  The  domestic  habits  of 
eccentric  men  of  genius,  much  more  those  of  a  man  so 
irreclaimably  irregular  as  Coleridge,  can  hardly  be  sup- 
posed to  promise  very  auspiciously  for  any  connection  so 
close  as  this.  A  very  extensive  house  and  household, 
together  with  tjie  unlimited  license  of  action  which 
belongs  to  the  menage  of  some  great  Dons  amongst  the 
nobility,  could  alone  have  made  Coleridge  an  inmate 
perfectly  desirable.  Probably  many  little  jealousies  and 
offences  had  been  mutually  suppressed ;  but  the  particu- 
lar spark  which  at  length  fell  amongst  the  combustible 
materials  already  prepared,  and  thus  produced  the  final 
explosion,  took  the  following  shape  :  —  Mr.  Montagu  had 
published  a  book  against  the  use  of  wine  and  intoxicating 
liquors  of  every  sort.  Not  out  of  parsimony,  or  under 
any  suspicion  of  inhospitality,  but  in  mere  self-consistency 
and  obedience  to  his  own  conscientious  scruples,  Mr. 
Montagu  would  not  countenance  the  use  of  wine  at  hia 
own  table.  So  far,  all  was  right.  But  doubtless,  on  such 
a  system,  under  the  known  habits  of  modern  life,  it 
ihould  have  been  made  a  rule  to  ask  no  man  to  dinner : 


SAMUEL  TAYLOR  COLEBIDGE. 


237 


for  to  force  men,  without  warning,  to  a  single  (and, 
therefore,  thoroughly  useless)  act  of  painful  abstinence, 
is  what  neither  I  nor  any  man  can  have  a  right  to  do.  In 
point  of  sense,  it  is  in  fact,  precisely  the  freak  of  Sir 
Roger  De  Coverley,  who  drenches  his  friend  the  Spectator 
with  a  hideous  decoction  :  not,  as  his  confiding  visitor  had 
supposed,  for  some  certain  and  immediate  benefit  to 
follow,  but  simply  as  having  a  tendency  (if  well  sup- 
ported by  many  years  continuance  of  similar  drenches) 
to  abate  the  remote  contingency  of  the  stone.  One  day's 
abstinence  could  do  no  good  on  any  scheme;  and  no 
man  was  likely  to  ofier  himself  for  a  second.  However, 
such  being  the  law  of  the  castle,  and  that  law  well  known 
to  Coleridge,  he,  neverthelesss,  thought  fit  to  ask  to  dinner 
Colonel,  then  Captain  Pasley,  of  the  Engineers,  well 
known  in  those  days  for  his  book  on  the  Military  Policy 
of  England  ;  and  since,  for  his  System  of  Professional 
Instruction.    Now,  where  or  in  what  land,  abides  that 

*  Captain,  or  Colonel,  or  Knight  in  arms,* 

to  whom  wine  in  the  analysis  of  dinner  is  a  neutral  or 
indifierent  element  ?  Wine,  therefore,  as  it  was  not  of  a 
nature  to  be  omitted,  Coleridge  took  care  to  furnish  at  his 
own  private  cost.  And  so  far,  again,  all  was  right.  But, 
why  must  Coleridge  give  his  dinner  to  the  Captain  in  Mr. 
Montagu's  house  ?  There  lay  the  afiront ;  and,  doubtless, 
it  was  a  very  inconsiderate  act  on  the  part  of  Coleridge. 
I  report  the  case  simply  as  it  was  then  generally  borne 
upon  the  breath,  not  of  scandal,  but  of  jest  and  merriment. 
The  result,  however,  was  no  jest ;  for  bitter  words  ensued 
—  words  that  festered  in  the  remembrance  ;  and  a  rupture 
oetween  the  parties  followed  which  no  reconciliation  ever 
bealed. 

Meantime,  on  reviewing  this  story,  as  generally  adopted 


238 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


by  tlie  learned  in  literal)^  scandal,  one  demur  rises  up. 
Dr.  Parr,  a  lisping  old  dotard,  without  dignity  or  power 
of  mind  of  any  sort,  was  a  frequent  and  privileged  inmate 
at  Mr.  Montagu's.  Him,  now,  this  Parr,  there  was  no 
conceivable  motive  for  enduring ;  that  point  is  satisfacto- 
rily settled  by  the  pompous  inanities  of  his  works.  Yet, 
on  the  other  hand,  his  habits  were  in  their  own  nature  far 
less  endurable;  for  the  monster  smoked; — and  how? 
How  did  the  '  Birmingham  Doctor '  smoke  ?  Not  as 
you  or  I,  or  other  civilized  people  smoke,  w^ith  a  gentle 
cigar  —  but  with  shag  tobacco.  And  those  who  know 
how  that  abomination  lodges  and  nestles  in  the  draperies 
of  window  curtains,  will  guess  the  horror  and  detestation 
in  which  the  old  Whig's  memory  is  held  by  all  enlight- 
ened women. 

*  *  Birmingham  Doctor : '  —  This  was  a  sobriquet  imposed  on 
Dr.  Parr  by  *  The  Pursuits  of  Literature,'  that  most  popular  of 
satires  at  the  end  of  the  eighteenth  and  opening  of  the  nineteenth 
centuries.  The  name  had  a  mixed  reference  to  the  doctor  s  personal 
connection  with  Warwickshire,  but  chiefly  to  the  doctor's  spurious 
and  windy  imitation  of  Dr.  Johnson.  He  was  viewed  as  the  Bir- 
ming  (or  mock)  Dr.  Johnson.  Why  the  word  Birmingham  has 
come  for  the  last  sixty  or  seventy  years  to  indicate  in  every  class  of 
articles  the  spurious  in  opposition  to  the  genuine,  I  suppose  to  have 
arisen  from  the  Birmingham  habit  of  reproducing  all  sorts  of  Lon- 
don or  Paris  trinkets,  bijouterie,  &c.,  in  cheaper  materials  and  with 
infericv  workmanship. 


SAMUEL  TAYLOR  COLERIDGE. 


239 


CHAPTER  IX. 

SAMUEL  TAYLOR  COLERIDGE. 


From  Mr.  Montagu's  Coleridge  passed,  by  favor  of 
what  introduction  I  never  heard,  into  a  family  as  amiable 
in  manners  and  as  benign  in  disposition,  as  I  remember  to 
have  ever  met  with.  On  this  excellent  family  I  look 
back  with  threefold  affection,  on  account  of  their  goodness 
to  Coleridge,  and  because  they  were  then  unfortunate,  and 
because  their  union  has  long  since  been  dissolved  by 
death.    The  family  was  composed  of  three  members :  of 

Mr.  M  ,  once  a  lawyer,  who  had,  however,  ceased 

to  practise  ;  of  Mrs.  M  ,  his  wife,  a  blooming  young 

woman,  distinguished  for  her  fine  person ;  and  a  young 
lady,  her  unmarried  sister.  Here,  for  some  years,  I  used 
to  visit  Coleridge ;  and,  doubtless,  as  far  as  situation 
merely,  and  the  most  delicate  attentions  from  the  most 
amiable  women,  could  make  a  man  happy,  he  must  have 
been  so  at  this  time  ;  for  both  the  ladies  treated  him  as 
an  elder  brother,  or  as  a  father.  At  length,  however,  the 
cloud  of  misfortune,  which  had  long  settled  upon  the 
prospects  of  this  excellent  family,  thickened ;  and  I  found, 
upon  one  of  my  visits  to  London,  that  they  had  given  up 
their  house  in  Berners  Street,  and  had  retired  to  a  cottage 
in  Wiltshire.  Coleridge  had  accompanied  them  ;  and  there 
I  visited  them  myself,  and,  as  it  eventually  proved,  for  the 
last  time.    Some  time  after  this,  I  heard  from  Coleridge, 


240 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


with  the  deepest  sorrow,  that  poor  M   had  beeB 

thrown  into  prison,  and  had  sunk  under  the  pressure  of 
his  misfortunes.  The  gentle  ladies  of  his  family  had  re- 
tired to  remote  friends ;  and  I  saw  them  no  more,  though 
often  vainly  making  inquiries  about  them. 

Coleridge,  during  this  part  of  his  London  life,  I  saw 
constantly  —  generally  once  a  day,  during  my  own  l^tay 
in  London ;  and  sometimes  we  were  jointly  engaged  to 
dinner  parties.  In  particular,  I  remember  one.  party  at 
which  we  met  Lady  Hamilton  —  Lord  Nelson's  Lady 
Hamilton  —  the  beautiful,  the  accomplished,  the  enchan- 
tress !  Coleridge  admired  her,  as  who  would  not  have 
done,  prodigiously  ;  and  she,  in  her  turn,  was  fascinated 
with  Coleridge.  He  was  unusually  effective  in  his  display  ; 
and  she,  by  way  of  expressing  her  acknowledgments 
appropriately,  performed  a  scene  in  Lady  Macbeth  —  how 
splendidly,  I  cannot  better  express,  than  by  saying  that 
all  of  us  who  then  witnessed  her  performance,  were  familiar 
with  Mrs.  Siddons's  matchless  execution  of  that  scene ; 
and  yet,  with  such  a  model  filling  our  imaginations,  we 
could  not  but  acknowledge  the  possibility  of  another,  and 
a  different  perfection,  without  a  trace  of  imitation,  equally 
original,  and  equally  astonishing.  The  word  'magnificent' 
is,  in  this  day,  most  lavishly  abused :  daily  I  hear  or  read 
in  the  newspapers  of  magnificent  objects,  as  though  scat- 
tered more  thickly  than  blackberries  ;  but  for  my  part  I 
have  seen  few  objects  really  deserving  that  epithet.  Lady 
Hamilton  was  one  of  them.  She  had  Medea's  beauty, 
and  Medea's  power  of  enchantment.  But  let  not  the 
reader  too  credulously  suppose  her  the  unprincipled 
woman  she  has  been  described.  I  know  of  no  sound 
reason  for  supposii^g  the  connection  between  Lord  Nelson 
and  her  to  have  been  other  than  perfectly  virtuous.  Her 
public  services,  I  am  sure,  were  most  eminent  —  for  that 


SAMUEL  TAYLOK  COLERIDGE. 


241 


we  have  indisputabk  authority;  and  equally  sure  I  am 
that  they  were  requited  with  rank  ingratitude. 

After  the  household  of  tte  poor  M  s  had  been 

dissolved,  I  know  not  whither  Coleridge  went  imme- 
diately :  for  I  did  not  visit  London  until  some  years  had 
elapsed.  In  1823-24,  I  first  understood  that  he  had 
taken  up  his  residence  as  a  guest  with  Mr.  Gillman,  a 
surgeon,  in  Highgate.  He  had  then  probably  resided  for 
some  time  at  that  gentleman's  :  there  he  continued  to 
reside  on  the  same  terms,  I  believe,  of  affectionate  friend- 
ship with  the  members  of  Mr.  Gillman's  family,  as  he 
had  made  life  endurable  to  him  in  the  time  of  the 

M  s;  and  there  he  died  in  July  of  the  present 

year.  If,  generally  speaking,  poor  Coleridge  had  but  a 
small  share  of  earthly  prosperity,  in  one  respect  at  least, 
he  was  eminently  favored  by  Providence :  beyond  all 
men  who  ever  perhaps  have  lived,  he  found  means  to 
engage  a  constant  succession  of  most  faithful  friends  ; 
and  he  levied  the  services  of  sisters,  brothers,  daughters, 
sons,  from  the  hands  of  strangers  —  attracted  to  him  by 
no  possible  impulses  but  those  of  reverence  for  his  intel- 
lect, and  love  for  his  gracious  nature.  How,  says  Words- 
worth — 

—  '  How  can  he  expect  that  others  should 

Sow  for  him,  reap  for  himt  and  at  his  call, 

Love  him,  who  for  himself  will  take  no  thought  at  all  ? ' 

How  can  he,  indeed  ?  It  is  most  unreasonable  to  do  so  : 
yet  this  expectation,  if  Coleridge  ought  not  to  have  en- 
tertained, at  all  events  he  realized.  Fast  as  one  friend 
dropped  off,  another,  and  another,  succeeded  :  perpetual 
relays  were  laid  along  his  path  in  life,  of  judicious  and 
zealous  supporters  :  who  comforted  his  days,  and  smoothed 
the  pillow  for  his  declining  age,  even  when  it  was  beyond 
all  human  power  to  take  a  way  the  thorns  which  stuffed  it. 
16 


812 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


And  what  were  those  thorns?  —  and  whence  derived? 
That  is  a  question  on  which  I  ought  to  decline  speaking, 
unless  I  could  speak  fully.  Not,  however,  to  make  any 
mystery  of  what  requires  none,  the  reader  will  understand 
that  originally  his  sufferings,  and  the  death  within  him 
of  all  hope  —  the  palsy,  as  it  were,  of  that  which  is  the 
life  of  life,  and  the  heart  within  the  heart  —  came  from 
opium.  But  two  things  I  must  add  —  one  to  explain 
Coleridge's  case,  and  the  other  to  bring  it  within  the 
indulgent  allowance  of  equitable  judges  :  —  First,  the 
sufferings  from  morbid  derangements,  originally  produced 
by  opium,  had  very  possibly  lost  that  simple  character, 
and  had  themselves  re-acted  in  producing  secondary  states 
of  disease  and  irritation,  not  any  longer  dependent  upon 
the  opium,  so  as  to  disappear  with  its  disuse :  hence,  a 
more  than  mortal  discouragement  to  accomplish  this  dis- 
use, when  the  pains  of  self-sacrifice  were  balanced  by  no 
gleams  of  restorative  feeling.  Yet,  secondly,  Coleridge 
did  make  prodigious  efforts  to  deliver  himself  from  this 
thraldom ;  and  he  went  so  far  at  one  time  in  Bristol,  to 
my  knowledge,  as  to  hire  a  man  for  the  express  purpose, 
and  armed  with  the  power  of  resolutely  interposing  be- 
tween himself  and  the  door  of  any  druggist's  shop.  I*" 
Is  true,  that  an  authority  derived  only  from  Coleridge'' 
will,  could  not  be  valid  against  Coleridge's  own  counter 
determination  :  he  could  resume  as  easily  as  he  coult 
delegate  the  power.  But  the  scheme  did  not  entirely  fail  • 
a  man  shrinks  from  exposing  to  another  that  infirmity  of 
will  which  he  might  else  have  but  a  feeble  motive  foi 
disguising  to  himself ;  and  the  delegated  man,  the  external 
conscience,  as  it  were,  of  Coleridge,  though  destined  —  in 
the  final  resort,  if  matters  came  to  absolute  rupture,  and 
to  an  obstinate  duel,  as  it  were,  between  himself  and  his 
principal  —  in  that  extremity  to  give  way,  yet  might  have 


SAMUEL  TAYLOR   COLEEIDGE.  J43 

long  protracted  the  struggle,  before  coming  to  that  rort  of 
dignus  vindice  nodus :  and  in  fact,  I  know,  upon  a''jsolute 
proof,  that,  before  reaching  that  crisis,  the  man  showed 
fight ;  and,  faithful  to  his  trust,  and  comprehending  the 
reasons  for  it,  he  declared  that  if  he  must  yield,  he  would 
'  know  the  reason  why.' 

Opium,  therefore,  subject  to  the  explanation  I  have 
made,  was  certainly  the  original  source  of  Coleridge's 
morbid  feelings,  of  his  debility,  and  of  his  remorse.  His 
pecuniary  embarrassments  pressed  as  lightly  as  could 
well  be  expected  upon  him.  I  have  mentioned  the 
annuity  of  £150  made  to  him  by  the  two  Wedgwoods. 
One  half,  I  believe,  could  not  be  withdrawn,  having  been 
left  by  a  regular  testamentary  bequest.  But  the  other 
moiety,  coming  from  the  surviving  brother,  was  withdrawn 
on  the  plea  of  commercial  losses,  somewhere,  I  think, 
about  1815.  That  would  have  been  a  heavy  blow  to 
Coleridge  ;  and  assuredly  the  generosity  is  not  very  con- 
spicuous, of  having  ever  suffered  an  allowance  of  that 
nature  to  be  left  to  the  mercy  of  accident.  Either  it 
ought  not  to  have  been  granted  in  that  shape  —  viz.  as  an 
annual  allowance,  giving  ground  for  expecting  its  periodi- 
cal recurrence  —  or  it  ought  not  to  have  been  withdrawn. 
However,  this  blow  was  broken  to  Coleridge  by  the  bounty 
of  George  IV.,  who  placed  Coleridge's  name  in  the  list  of 
twelve,  to  whom  he  granted  an  annuity  of  100  guineas 
per  annum.  This  he  enjoyed  so  long  as  that  Prince 
reigned.  But  at  length  came  a  heavier  blow  than  that 
from  Mr.  Wedgwood  :  a  new  King  arose,  who  knew  not 
Joseph.  Yet  surely  he  was  not  a  King  who  could  so 
easily  resolve  to  turn  adrift  twelve  men  of  letters,  many 
of  them  most  accomplished  men,  for  the  sake  of  appro- 
priating a  sum  no  larger  to  himself  than  1200  guineas  — 
no  less  to  some  of  them  than  the  total  freight  of  their 


244 


LITEEAEr  BEMINISCENCES. 


earthly  hopes  ?  —  No  matter :  let  the  deed  have  been  from 
whose  h&nd  it  might,  it  was  done  :  tiQyagai  it  was  perpe- 
trated, as  saith  the  Medea  of  Euripides  ;  and  it  will  be 
mentioned  hereafter,  '  more  than  either  once  or  twice.' 
It  fell  with  weight,  and  with  effect  upon  the  latter  days  of 
Coleridge  ;  it  took  from  him  as  much  heart  and  hope  as  at 
his  years,  and  with  his  unworldly  prospects,  remained 
for  man  to  blight :  and,  if  it  did  not  utterly  crush  him, 
the  reason  was  —  because  for  himself  he  had  never 
needed  much,  and  was  now  continually  drawing  near  to 
that  haven,  in  which,  for  himself,  he  would  need  nothing  ; 
secondly,  because  his  children  were  now  independent  of 
his  aid  ;  and,  finally,  because  in  this  land  there  are  men 
to  be  found  always  of  minds  large  enough  to  comprehend 
the  claims  of  genius,  and  with  hearts,  by  good  luck, 
more  generous,  by  infinite  degrees,  than  the  hearts  of 
Princes. 

Coleridge,  as  I  now  understand,  ^Tas  somewhere  about 
sixty-two  years  of  age  when  he  died.  This,  however,  I 
take  upon  the  report  of  the  public  newspapers  ;  for  I  do 
not,  of  my  own  knowledge,  know  anything  accurately 
upon  that  point.  ^' 

It  can  hardly  be  necessary  to  inform  any  reader  of 
discernment  or  of  much  practice  in  composition,  that  the 
whole  of  this  article  upon  Mr.  Coleridge,  though  carried 
through  at  intervals,  and  (as  it  has  unexpectedly  happened) 
with  time  sufficient  to  have  made  it  a  very  careful  one, 
i^as,  in  fact,  been  written  in  a  desultory  and  unpre- 
meditated  style.  It  was  originally  undertaken  on  the 
Budden  but  profound  impulse  communicated  to  the  writer's 
feelings,  by  the  unexpected  news  of  this  great  man's 
death  ;  partly,  therefore,  to  relieve  by  expressing  his  own 
deep  sentiments  of  reverential  affection  to  his  memory 
and  nartly,  in  however  imperfect  a  way,  to  meet  th? 


SAMUEL  TAYLOR  COLEKIDGE. 


245 


public  feeling  of  interest  or  curiosity  about  a  man  who 
had  long  taken  his  place  amongst  the  intellectual  poten- 
tates of  the  age.  Both  purposes  required  that  it  should 
be  written  almost  extempore :  the  greater  part  was  really 
ani  unaffectedly  written  in  that  way,  and  under  circum- 
stances of  such  extreme  haste,  as  would  justify  the 
writer  in  pleading  the  very  amplest  privilege  of  license 
and  indulgent  construction  which  custom  concedes  to 
such  cases.  Hence  it  had  occurred  to  the  writer,  as  a 
judicious  principle,  to  create  a  sort  of  merit  out  of  his 
own  necessity  ;  and  rather  to  seek  after  the  graces  which 
belong  to  the  epistolary  form,  or  to  other  modes  of 
composition  professedly  careless,  than  after  those  which 
grow  out  of  preconceived  biographies,  which,  having 
originally  settled  their  plan  upon  a  regular  foundation, 
are  able  to  pursue  a  course  of  orderly  development,  such 
as  his  slight  sketch  had  voluntarily  renounced  from  the 
beginning.  That  mode  of  composition  having  been  once 
adopted,  it  seemed  proper  to  sustain  it,  even  after  delays 
and  interruption  had  allowed  time  for  throwing  the  narra- 
tive into  a  more  orderly  movement,  and  modulating,  as  it 
were,  into  a  key  of  the  usual  solemnity.  The  qualis  ah 
incepto  pro  cesser  it  —  the  or  do  prescribed  by  the  first  bars 
of  the  music  predominated  over  all  other  considerations, 
anC  to  such  an  extent,  that  he  had  purposed  to  leave  the 
article  without  any  regular  termination  or  summing  up  — 
as,  on  the  one  hand,  scarcely  demanded  by  the  character 
of  a  sketch  so  rapid  and  indigested,  whilst,  on  the  other, 
he  was  sensible  that  anything  of  so  much  pretension  as  a 
"ormal  peroration,  challenged  a  sort  of  consideration  to 
the  paper  which  it  was  the  author's  chief  wish  to  disclaim. 
That  effect,  however,  is  sufficiently  parried  by  the  implied 
protest  now  offered  ;  and,  on  other  reasons,  it  is  certainly 
desirable  that  a  general  glance,  however  cursory,  should 


246 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


be  tliro\vii  over  the  intellectual  claims  of  Mr.  Coleridge, 
by  one  who  knew  him  so  well,  and  especially  in  a  casa 
where  those  very  claims  constitute  the  entire  and  sole 
justification  of  the  preceding  personal  memoir.  That 
which  furnishes  the  whole  moving  reason  for  any  separate 
notice  at  all,  and  forms  its  whole  latent  interest,  ought  not, 
in  mere  logic,  to  be  left  without  some  notice  itself,  though 
as  rapidly  executed  as  the  previous  biographical  sketch, 
and,  from  the  necessity  of  the  subject,  by  many  times  over 
more  imperfect. 

To  this  task,  therefore,  the  writer  now  addresses 
himself;  and  by  way  of  gaining  greater  freedom  of 
movement,  and  of  resuming  his  conversational  tone,  he 
will  here  again  take  the  liberty  of  speaking  in  the  first 
person. 

If  Mr.  Coleridge  had  been  merely  a  scholar  —  merely 
a  philologist  —  or  merely  a  man  of  science  —  there  would 
be  no  reason  apparent  for  travelling  in  our  survey  beyond 
the  field  of  his  intellect,  rigorously  and  narrowly  so 
called.  But  because  he  was  a  poet,  and  because  he  was  a 
philosopher,  in  a  comprehensive  and  a  most  human  sense, 
with  whose  functions  the  moral  nature  is  so  largely  inter- 
woven, I  shall  feel  myself  entitled  to  notice  the  most 
striking  aspects  of  his  character^  (using  that  word  in  its 
common  limited  meaning,)  of  his  disposition,  and  his 
manners,  as  so  many  reflex  indications  of  his  intellectual 
constitution.  But  let  it  be  well  understood  that  I  design 
nothing  elaborate,  nothing  comprehensive  or  ambitious  : 
my  purpose  is  merely  to  supply  a  few  hints  and  sugges- 
tions drawn  from  a  very  hasty  retrospect,  by  way  ot 
adding  a  few  traits  to  any  outline  which  the  reader  may 
have  framed  to  himself,  either  from  some  personal  knowl- 
edge, or  from  more  full  and  lively  memorials. 

One  character,  in  which  Mr.  Coleridge  most  often  came 


SAMUEL  TAYLOR  OOL^RIDGE. 


241 


before  the  public,  was  tbat  of  politician.  In  this  age  of 
fervent  partisanship,  it  will,  therefore,  naturally  occur  as 
a  first  question,  to  inquire  after  his  party  and  political 
connections :  was  he  Whig,  Tory,  or  Radical  ?  Oi, 
under  a  new  classification,  were  his  propensities  Conser- 
vative or  Reforming  ?  I  answer  that,  in  any  exclusive  or 
emphatic  sense,  he  was  none  of  these  ;  because,  as  a 
philosopher,  he  was,  according  to  circumstances,  and 
according  to  the  object  concerned,  all  of  these  by  turns. 
These  are  distinctions  upon  which  a  cloud  of  delusion 
rests.  It  would  not  be  difiicult  to  show,  that  in  the  spec- 
ulations built  upon  the  distinction  of  Whig  and  Tory, 
even  by  as  pliilosophic  a  politician  as  Edmund  Burke, 
there  is  an  oversight  of  the  largest  practical  importance. 
But  the  general  and  partisan  use  of  these  terms  superadds 
to  this  nqwTov  ^Fsvdog  a  sccond  which  is  much  more  flagrant. 
It  is  this  :  the  terms  Whig  or  Tory,  used  by  partisans,  are 
taken  extra  gradum,  as  expressing  the  ideal  or  extreme 
cases  of  the  several  creeds ;  whereas,  in  actual  life,  few 
such  cases  are  found  realized,  by  far  the  major  part  of 
those  who  answer  to  either  one  or  the  other  denomination 
making  only  an  approximation  (difiering  by  infinite 
degrees)  to  the  ideal  or  abstract  type.  A  third  error 
there  is,  relating  to  the  actual  extent  of  the  several 
denominations,  even  after  every  allowance  made  for  the 
faintest  approximations.  Listen  to  a  Whig,  or  to  a  Tory, 
and  you  will  suppose  that  the  great  bulk  of  society  range 
under  his  banner  :  all,  at  least,  who  have  any  property  at 
^take.  Listen  to  a  Radical,  and  you  will  suppose  that  all 
Kie  marshalled  in  the  same  ranks  with  himself,  unless 
those  who  have  some  private  interest  in  existing  abuses, 
ir  have  aristocratic  privileges  to  defend.  Yet,  upon  going 
txtensively  into  society  as  it  is,  you  find  that  a  vast 
majority  of  good  citizens  are  of  no  party  whatsoever,  own 


248 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES, 


no  party  designation,  care  for  no  party  interest,  but  larry 
their  good  wishes  by  turns  to  men  of  every  party,  accord- 
ing to  the  momentary  purpose  they  are  pursuing.  As  to 
Whig  and  Tory,  it  is  pretty  clear  that  only  two  classes  of 
men,  both  of  limited  extent,  acknowledge  these  as  their 
distinctions ;  first,  those  who  make  politics  in  some  measure 
their  profession  or  trade  —  whether  by  standing  forward 
habitually  in  public  meetings  as  leaders  or  as  assistants, 
or  by  writing  books  and  pamphlets  in  the  same  cause ; 
secondly,  those  whose  rank,  or  birth,  or  position  in  a  city, 
or  a  rural  district,  almost  pledge  them  to  a  share  in  the 
political  struggles  of  the  day,  under  the  penalty  of  being 
held  faineans,  truants,  or  even  malignant  recusants,  if 
they  should  decline  a  warfare  which  often,  perhaps,  they 
do  not  love  in  secret.  These  classes,  which,  after  all,  are 
not  numerous,  and  not  entirely  sincere,  compose  the 
whole  extent  of  professing  Whigs  and  Tories  who  make 
any  approach  to  the  standards  of  their  two  churches ;  and, 
generally  speaking,  these  persons  have  succeeded  to  their 
politics  and  their  party  ties,  as  they  have  to  their  estates, 
viz.  by  inheritance.  Not  their  way  of  thinking  in  politics 
has  dictated  their  party  connections ;  but  these  connec- 
tions, traditionally  bequeathed  from  one  generation  to 
another,  have  dictated  their  politics. 

With  respect  to  the  Radical  or  the  Reformer,  the  case 
is  otherwise ;  for,  it  is  certain,  that  in  this,  as  in  every 
great  and  enlightened  nation,  enjoying  an  intense  and 
fervid  communication  of  thought  through  the  press,  there 
is,  and  must  be,  a  tendency  widely  diffused  to  the  princi- 
ples of  sane  reform  —  an  anxiety  to  probe  and  examine 
»ill  the  institutions  of  the  land  by  the  increasing  lights  of 
the  age  —  and  a  salutary  determination  that  no  acknowl- 
?dged  abuse  shall  be  sheltered  by  prescription,  or  privi- 
ledged  b}  its  antiquity.    In  saying,  therefore,  that  Aw 


SAMUEL  TAYLOR  COLERIDGE. 


249 


principles  are  spread  over  the  length  and  breadth  of  tha 
land,  the  Reformer  says  no  more  than  the  truth.  Whig 
and  Tory,  as  usually  understood,  express  only  two  modes 
of  aristocratic  partisanship :  and  it  is  strange,  indeed,  to 
find  people  deluded  by  the  notion  that  the  reforming 
principle  has  any  more  natural  connection  with  the  first 
than  the  last.  Reformer,  on  the  other  hand,  to  a  cer- 
tain extent  expresses  the  political  creed  and  aspect  of 
almost  every  enlightened  citizen  :  but,  then,  how  ?  Not 
as  the  Radical  would  insinuate,  as  pledging  a  man  to  a 
specific  set  of  objects,  or  to  any  visible  and  apparent 
party,  having  known  leaders  and  settled  modes  of  action. 
British  society,  in  its  large  majority,  may  be  fairly 
described  as  Reformers,  in  the  sense  of  being  favorably 
disposed  to  a  general  spirit  of  ventilation  and  reform 
carried  through  all  departments  of  public  business,  politi- 
cal or  judicial ;  but  it  is  so  far  from  being,  therefore,  true 
that  men,  in  general,  are  favorably  disposed  to  any  known 
party,  in  or  out  of  Parliament,  united  for  certain  objects 
and  by  certain  leaders,  that,  on  the  contrary,  this  reform- 
ing party  itself  has  no  fixed  unity,  and  no  generally 
acknowledged  heads.  It  is  divided  both  as  to  persons 
and  as  to  things :  the  ends  to  be  pursued  create  as  many 
schisms,  as  the  course  of  means  proper  for  the  pursuit, 
and  the  choice  of  agents  for  conducting  the  public  wishes. 
In  fact,  it  would  be  even  more  difficult  to  lay  down  the 
ideal  standard  of  a  Reformer,  or  his  abstract  creed,  than 
if  a  Tory :  and  supposing  this  done,  it  would  be  found, 
m  practice,  that  the  imperfect  approximations  to  the  pure 
'^aith  would  difier  by  even  broader  shades,  as  regarded  the 
reforming  creed,  than  as  regarded  that  of  the  rigorous  or 
ultra  Tory. 

With  respect  to  Mr.  Coleridge,  he  was  certainly  a  friend 
\p  all  enlightened  reforms ;  he  was  a  friend,  for  example, 


250 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


to  lleform  in  Parliament.  Sensible,  as  lie  was,  of  the 
prodigious  diffusion  of  knowledge  and  good  sense  amongst 
the  classes  immediately  below  the  gentry  in  British  so- 
ciety, he  could  not  but  acknowledge  their  right  to  a  larger 
and  a  less  indirect  share  of  political  influence.  As  to  the 
plan,  and  its  extent,  and  its  particular  provisions,  upon 
those  he  hesitated  and  wavered ;  as  other  friends  to  the 
same  views  have  done,  and  will  continue  to  do.  The 
only  avowed  objects  of  modern  Reformers  which  he  would 
strenuously  have  opposed,  nay,  would  have  opposed  with 
the  zeal  of  an  ancient  martyr,  are  those  which  respect  the 
Church  of  England,  and,  therefore,  most  of  those  which 
respect  the  two  Universities  of  Oxford  and  Cambridge. 
There  he  would  have  been  found  in  the  first  ranks  of  the 
Anti-Reformers.  He  would  also  have  supported  the 
House  of  Peers  as  the  tried  bulwark  of  our  social  interests 
in  many  a  famous  struggle,  and  sometimes,  in  the  hour 
of  need,  the  sole  barrier  against  despotic  aggressions  on 
the  one  hand,  and  servile  submissions  on  the  other. 
Moreover,  he  looked  with  favor  upon  many  modes  of 
aristocratic  influence  as  balances  to  new-made  commercial 
wealth,  and  to  a  far  baser  tyranny  likely  to  arise  from 
that  quarter  when  unbalanced.  But  allowing  for  these 
points  of  difference,  I  know  of  little  else  stamped  with  the 
general  seal  of  modern  reform,  and  claiming  to  be  a 
privileged  object  for  a  national  effort,  v/hich  would  not 
have  had  his  countenance.  It  is  true,  and  this  I  am 
sensible  will  be  objected,  that  his  party  connections  were 
chiefly  with  the  Tories ;  and  it  adds  a  seeming  strength  to 
this  objection,  that  these  connections  were  not  those  of 
accident,  nor  those  which  he  inherited,  nor  those  of  his 
youthful  choice.  They  were  sought  out  by  himself,  and 
cn  his  maturer  years ;  or  else  they  w^ere  such  as  sough* 
him  for  the  sake  of  his  politica]  principles ;  and  equally^ 


BIMTTEL  TAYLOR  COLERIDGE. 


251 


in  eitKer  case,  they  argued  some  affinity  in  his  political 
creed.  This  much  cannot  be  denied.  But  one  consid- 
eration will  serve  greatly  to  qualify  the  inference  from 
tliese  facts.  In  those  years  when  Mr.  Coleridge  became 
connected  with  Tories,  what  was  the  predominating  and 
cardinal  principal  of  Toryism,  in  comparison  with  which 
all  else  was  willingly  slighted  ?  Circumstances  of  posi- 
tion had  thrown  upon  the  Tories  the  onus  of  a  great 
national  struggle,  the  greatest  which  history  anywhere 
records,  and  with  an  enemy  the  most  deadly.  The  Whigs 
were  then  out  of  power  :  they  were  therefore  in  opposition ; 
and  that  one  fact,  the  simple  fact,  of  holding  an  anti- 
ministerial  position,  they  allowed,  by  a  most  fatal  blunder, 
to  determine  the  course  of  their  foreign  politics.  Napo- 
leon was  to  be  cherished  simply  because  he  was  a  thorn  in 
Mr.  Pitt's  side.  So  began  their  foreign  policy  —  and  in 
that  pettiest  of  personal  views.  Because  they  were  anti- 
ministerial,  they  allowed  themselves  passively  to  become 
anti-national.  To  be  a  Whig,  therefore,  in  those  days, 
implied  little  more  than  a  strenuous  opposition  to  foreign 
war — to  be  a  Tory,  pledged  a  man  to  little  more  than 
war  with  Napoleon  Bonaparte. 

And  this  view  of  our  foreign  relations  it  was  that  con- 
nected Coleridge  with  Tories  —  a  view  which  arose  upon 
no  motives  of  selfish  interest,  (as  too  often  has  been  said 
in  reproach,)  but  upon  the  changes  wrought  in  the  spirit 
of  the  French  Republic,  which  gradually  transmuted  its 
defensive  warfare  (framed  originally  to  meet  a  conspi- 
racy of  kings  crusading  against  the  new-born  democracy 
of  French  institutions,  whilst  yet  in  their  cradle)  into  a 
warfare  of  aggression  and  sanguinary  ambition.  The 
military  strength  evoked  in  France  by  the  madness  of 
European  kings,  had  taught  her  the  secret  of  her  own 
»)owcr  —  a  secret  too  dangerous  for  a  nation  of  vanity  sa 


252 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES, 


infinite,  and  so  feeble  in  all  means  of  moral  self-restraint. 
The  temptation  to  foreign  conquest  was  too  strong  for  the 
national  principles  ;  and,  in  this  way,  all  that  had  been 
grand  and  pure  in  the  early  pretensions  of  French  Repub- 
licanism rapidly  melted  away  before  the  common  bribes 
of  vulgar  ambition.  Unoffending  states,  such  as  Switzer- 
land, we^re  the  first  to  be  trampled  under  foot ;  no  voice 
was  heard  any  more  but  the  brazen  throat  of  war ; '  and 
after  all  that  had  been  vaunted  of  a  golden  age,  and  a 
long  career  opened  to  the  sceptre  of  pure  political  justice, 
the  clouds  gathered  more  gloomily  than  ever ;  and  the 
sword  was  once  more  reinstated,  as  the  sole  arbiter  of 
right,  with  less  disguise  and  less  reserve  than  under  the 
vilest  despotism  of  kings.  The  change  was  in  the  French 
Republicans,  not  in  their  foreign  admirers  ;  they,  in  mere 
consistency,  were  compelled  into  corresponding  changes, 
and  into  final  alienation  of  sympathy,  as  they  beheld,  one 
after  one,  all  titles  forfeited,  by  which  that  grand  explosion 
of  pure  democracy  had  originally  challenged  and  sus- 
tained their  veneration.  The  mighty  Republic  had  now 
begun  to  revolve  through  those  fierce  transmigrations  fore- 
seen by  Burke,  to  every  one  of  which,  by  turns,  he  had 
denounced  an  inevitable  '  purification  by  fire  and  blood : ' 
no  trace  remained  of  her  primitive  character  :  and  of  that 
awful  outbreak  of  popular  might,  which  once  had  made 
France  the  land  of  hope  and  promise  to  the  whole  human 
race,  and  had  sounded  a  knell  to  every  form  of  oppression 
or  abuse,  no  record  was  to  be  found,  except  in  the  stupen- 
dous power  which  cemented  its  martial  oligarchy.  Of 
the  people,  of  the  democracy  —  or  that  it  had  ever  for  an 
hour  been  roused  from  its  slumbers  —  one  sole  evidence 
remained  ;  and  that  lay  in  the  blank  power  of  destruc- 
tion, and  its  perfect  organization,  which  none  but  a 
popular  movement,  no  power  short  of  that,  could  havi 


SAMUEL  TAYLOR  COLERIDGE. 


253 


created.  The  people  having  been  unchained,  and,  as  if 
for  the  single  purpose  of  creating  a  vast  system  of  de- 
stroying energies,  had  then  immediately  recoiled  within 
their  old  limits,  and  themselves  become  the  earliest  victim 
of  their  own  statocracy.  In  this  way  France  had  tecome 
an  object  of  jealousy  and  alarm.  It  remained  to  see  to 
what  purpose  she  would  apply  her  new  energies.  That 
was  soon  settled  ;  her  new-born  power  was  wielded  from 
the  first  by  unprincipled  and  by  ambitious  men  ;  and,  in 
1800,  it  fell  under  the  permanent  control  of  an  autocrat, 
whose  unity  of  purpose,  and  iron  will,  left  no  room  for  any 
hope  of  change. 

Under  these  circumstances,  under  these  prospects, 
coupled  with  this  retrospect,  what  became  the  duty  of  all 
foreign  politicians  ?  of  the  English  above  all,  as  natural 
leaders  in  any  hopeful  scheme  of  resistance  ?  The  ques- 
tion can  scarcely  be  put  with  decency.  Time  and  season, 
place  or  considerations  of  party,  all  alike  vanished  before 
an  elementary  duty  to  the  human  race,  which  much 
transcended  any  duty  of  exclusive  patriotism.  Plant  it, 
however,  on  that  narrower  basis,  and  the  answer  would 
have  been  the  same  for  all  centuries,  and  for  every  land 
under  a  corresponding  state  of  circumstances.  Of  Napo- 
leon's real  purposes  there  cannot  now  be  any  reasonable 
doubt.  His  confessions  —  and,  in  particular,  his  indirect 
revelations  at  St.  Helena  —  have  long  since  removed  all 
demurs  or  scruples  of  scepticism.  For  England,  there- 
fore, as  in  relation  to  a  man  bent  upon  her  ruin,  all  dis- 
tinctions of  party  were  annihilated  —  Whig  and  Tory 
were  merged  and  swallowed  up  in  the  transcendent  duties 
of  patriots  —  Englishmen  —  lovers  of  liberty,  Tories,  as 
Tories,  had  here  no  peculiar  or  separate  duties  —  none 
which  belonged  to  their  separate  creed  in  politics.  Their 
duties  were  paramount ;  and  their  partisanship  had  here 


254 


LITERACY  REMINISCENCES. 


no  application  —  was  perfectly  indifferent,  and  spoke 
neither  this  way  or  that.  In  one  respect  only  they  had 
peculiar  duties,  and  a  peculiar  responsibility  ;  peculiar, 
however,  not  by  any  difference  of  quality,  but  in  its 
supreme  degree ;  the  same  duties  which  belonged  to  all, 
belonged  to  them  by  a  heavier  responsibility.  And  how, 
or  why  ?  Not  as  Tories  had  they,  or  could  they  have 
any  functions  at  all  applying  to  this  occasion  ;  it  was  as 
being  then  the  ministerial  party,  as  the  party  accidentally 
in  power  at  the  particular  crisis  :  in  that  character  it  was 
that  they  had  any  separate  or  higher  degree  of  responsi- 
bility ;  otherwise,  and  as  to  the  kind  of  their  duty  apart 
from  this  degree,  the  Tories  stood  in  the  same  circum- 
stances as  men  of  all  other  parties.  To  the  Tories, 
however,  as  accidentally  in  possession  of  the  supreme 
power,  and  wielding  the  national  forces  at  that  time,  and 
directing  their  application  —  to  them  it  was  that  the  honor 
belonged  of  making  a  beginning :  on  them  had  devolved 
the  privilege  of  opening  and  authorizing  the  dread  cru- 
sade. How  and  in  what  spirit  they  acquitted  themselves 
of  that  most  enviable  task  —  enviable  for  its  sanctity  — 
fearful  for  the  difhculty  of  its  adequate  fulfilment  —  how 
they  persevered  —  and  whether,  at  any  crisis,  the  direst 
and  most  ominous  to  the  righteous  cause,  they  faltered  or 
gave  sign  of  retreating  —  history  will  tell  —  history  has 
already  told. 

To  the  Whigs  belonged  the  duty  of  seconding  theii 
old  antagonists :  and  no  wise  man  could  have  doubted, 
that,  in  a  case  of  transcendent  patriotism,  where  none  of 
those  principles  could  possibly  apply,  by  which  the  two 
parties  were  divided  and  distinguished,  the  Whigs  would 
be  anxious  to  show  that,  for  the  interests  of  their  common 
country,  they  could  cheerfully  lay  aside  all  those  party 
dlstinctionSj  and  forget  those  feuds  which  now  had  no 


SAMDEL  TAYLOR  COLERIDGE. 


256 


pertinence  or  meaning.  Simply  as  Whigs,  had  they 
stood  in  no  other  relation,  they  probably  would  have  done 
so.  Unfortunately  however,  for  their  own  good  name 
and  popularity  in  after  times,  they  were  divided  from  the 
other  party,  not  merely  as  Whigs  opposed  to  Tories,  but 
also  upon  another  and  a  more  mortifying  distinction, 
which  was  not,  like  the  first,  a  mere  inert  question  of 
speculation  or  theory,  but  involved  a  vast  practical  differ- 
ence of  honors  and  emoluments :  —  they  were  divided, 
I  say,  on  another  and  more  vexatious  principle,  as  the 
Outs  opposed  to  the  Ins,  Simply  as  Whigs,  they  might 
have  coalesced  with  the  Tories  quoad  hoc,  and  merely 
for  this  one  purpose.  But  as  men  out  of  power,  they 
could  not  coalesce  with  those  who  were  in.  They  con- 
stituted '  his  Majesty's  Opposition  ; '  and,  in  a  fatal  hour, 
they  determined  that  it  was  fitting  to  carry  on  their 
general  scheme  of  hostility  even  into  this  sacred  and 
privileged  ground.  That  resolution  once  taken,  they 
found  it  necessary  to  pursue  it  with  zeal.  The  case  itself 
was  too  weighty  and  too  interesting  to  allow  of  any 
moderate  tone  for  the  abetters  or  opposers.  Passion  and 
personal  bitterness  soon  animated  the  contest :  violent 
and  rash  predictions  were  hazarded  —  prophecies  of  utter 
ruin  and  of  captivity  for  our  whole  army  were  solemnly 
delivered  :  and  it  soon  became  evident,  as  indeed  mere 
human  infirmity  made  it  beforehand  but  too  probable,  that 
where  so  much  personal  credit  was  at  stake  upon  the  side 
of  our  own  national  dishonor,  the  wishes  of  the  prophet 
had  been  pledged  to  the  same  result  as  the  credit  of  his 
political  sagacity.  Many  were  the  melancholy  illustra- 
tions of  the  same  general  case.  Men  were  seen  fighting 
Bgainst  the  evidences  of  some  great  British  victory  with 
all  the  bitterness  and  fierce  incredulity  which  usually  meet 
the  first  rumors  of  some  private  calamity  :  that  was  ia 


256 


LITERARt  REMINISCENCES. 


effect  the  aspect  in  their  eyes  of  each  national  triumph  in 
its  turn.  Their  position,  connected  with  the  unfortunate 
election  made  by  the  Whig  leaders  of  their  tone,  from  the 
very  opening  of  the  contest,  gave  the  character  of  a 
calamity  for  them  and  for  their  party,  to  that  which  to 
every  other  heart  in  Britain  was  the  noblest  of  triumphs 
in  the  noblest  of  causes  ;  and,  as  a  party,  the  Whigs 
mourned  for  years  over  those  events  which  quickened 
the  pulses  of  pleasure  and  sacred  exultation  in  every 
other  heart.  God  forbid  that  all  Whigs  should  have  felt 
in  this  unnatural  way  !  I  speak  only  of  the  tone  set  by 
the  Parliamentary  leaders.  The  few  who  were  in  Par- 
liament, and  exposed  to  daily  taunts  from  the  just  exulta- 
tion of  their  irritated  opponents,  had  their  natural  feelings 
poisoned  and  envenomed.  The  many  who  were  out  of 
Parliament,  and  not  personally  interested  in  this  warfare 
of  the  Houses,  were  left  open  to  natural  influences  of 
patriotic  pride,  and  to  the  contagion  of  public  sympathy : 
and  these,  though  Whigs,  felt  as  became  them. 

These  are  things  too  unnatural  to  be  easily  believed; 
or,  in  a  land  where  the  force  of  partisanship  is  less,  to  be 
easily  understood.  Being  true,  however,  they  ought  not 
to  be  forgotten  :  and  at  present  it  is  almost  necessary 
that  they  should  be  stated  for  the  justification  of  Coler- 
idge. Too  much  has  been  written  upon  this  part  of  his 
life,  and  too  many  reproaches  thrown  out  upon  his  levity 
or  his  want  of  principle  in  his  supposed  sacrifice  of  his 
early  political  connections,  to  make  it  possible  for  any 
reverencer  of  Coleridge's  memory  to  pass  over  the  case 
without  a  full  explanation.  That  explanation  is  involved 
in  the  strange  and  scandalous  conduct  of  the  Parliamen- 
tary Whigs.  Coleridge  passed  over  to  the  Tories  only  in 
ehat  sense  in  which  all  patriots  did  so  at  that  time,  and  in 
relation  to  our  gma,t  foreign  interest  —  viz.  by  refusing  to 


SAMUEL  TAYLOR  COLERIDGE. 


257 


accompany  the  Whigs  in  their  almost  perfidious  demeanor 
towards  Napoleon  Bonaparte.  Anti-ministerial  they  af- 
fect to  style  their  policy,  but  in  the  most  eminent  sense  it 
was  anti-nationaL  It  was  thus  far — viz.  exclusively,  or 
almost  exclusively,  in  relation  to  our  great  feud  with 
Napoleon  —  that  Coleridge  adhered  to  the  Tories.  But 
because  this  feud  was  so  capital  and  so  earth-shaking  a 
quarrel,  that  it  occupied  all  hearts  and  all  the  councils  of 
Christendom,  suffering  no  other  question  almost  to  live  in 
its  neighborhood,  hence  it  happened  that  he  who  acceded 
to  the  Tories  in  this  one  chapter  of  their  policy,  was  re- 
garded as  an  ally  in  the  most  general  sense.  Domestic 
politics  were  then,  in  fact,  forgotten  ;  no  question,  in  any 
proper  sense  a  Tory  one,  ever  arose  in  that  era ;  or,  if  i- 
had,  the  public  attention  would  not  have  settled  upon  it ; 
and  it  would  speedily  have  been  dismissed. 

Hence  I  deduce  as  a  possibility,  and,  from  my  knowl- 
edge of  Coleridge,  I  deduce  it  as  a  fact,  that  his  adhesion 
to  the  Tories  was  bounded  by  his  approbation  of  their 
foreign  policy  ;  and  even  of  that  —  rarely  in  its  execu- 
tive details,  rarely  even  in  its  military  plans,  (for  these  he 
assailed  with  more  keenness  of  criticism  than  to  me  the 
case  seemed  to  justify,)  but  solely  in  its  animating  prin- 
ciple —  its  moving  and  sustaining  force,  viz.  the  doctrine 
and  entire  faith  that  Napoleon  Bonaparte  ought  to  be 
resisted,  was  not  a  proper  object  of  diplomacy  or  nego- 
tiation, and  could  be  resisted  hopefully  and  triumphantly. 
Thus  far  he  went  along  with  the  Tories  :  in  all  else  he 
belonged  quite  as  much  to  other  parties  —  so  far  as  he 
belonged  to  any.  And  that  he  did  not  follow  any  bias  of 
private  interest  in  connecting  himself  with  Tories,  or 
rather  in  allowing  Tories  to  connect  themselves  with 
him,  appears  (rather  more  indeed  than  it  ought  to  have 
tppeared)  on  the  very  surface  of  his  life.  From  Tory 
17 


258 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


munificence  he  drew  nothing  at  all,  unless  it  should  be 
imputed  to  his  Tory  connections  that  George  IV.  selected 
him  for  one  of  his  academicians.  But  this  slight  mark  of 
royal  favor,  he  owed,  I  believe,  to  other  considerations 
and  I  have  reason  to  think  that  this  way  of  treating  politi- 
cal questions,  so  wide  of  dogmatism,  and  laying  open  so 
vast  a  field  to  scepticism  that  might  else  have  gone 
unregarded,  must  have  been  held  as  evidence  of  too 
latitudinarian  a  creed  to  justify  a  title  to  Toryism.  And, 
upon  the  whole,  I  am  of  opinion,  that  few  events  of  Mr. 
Coleridge's  life  were  better  calculated  to  place  his  dis- 
interested pursuit  of  truth  in  a  luminous  aspect.  In  fact, 
his  carelessness  of  all  worldly  interests  was  too  notorious 
to  leave  him  open  to  suspicions  of  that  nature  :  nor  was 
this  carelessness  kept  within  such  limits  as  to  be  altogether 
meritorious.  There  is  no  doubt  that  his  indolence  con- 
curred, in  some  degree,  to  that  line  of  conduct  and  to 
that  political  reserve  which  would,  at  all  events,  have 
been  pursued,  in  a  degree  beyond  what  honor  the  sever- 
est, or  delicacy  the  most  nervous,  could  have  enjoined. 

It  is  a  singular  anecdote,  after  all,  to  report  of  Coler- 
idge, who  incurred  the  reproach  of  having  ratted  solely 
by  his  inability  to  follow  the  friends  of  his  early  days  into 
what  his  heart  regarded  as  a  monstrous  and  signal  breach 
of  patriotism,  that  in  any  eminent  sense  he  was  not  a 
patriot.  His  understanding  in  this,  as  in  many  instances, 
was  too  active,  too  restless,  for  any  abiding  feelings  to 
lay  hold  of  him,  unless  when  they  coincided  with  some 
palpable  command  of  nature.  Parental  love,  for  instance, 
was  too  holy  a  thing  to  be  submitted  for  an  instant  to  any 
scrutiny  or  any  jealousy  of  his  hair-splitting  understanding 
But  it  must  be  something  as  sacred  and  as  profound  as 
that  which  with  Coleridge  could  long  support  the  endlesj 
attrition  of  his  too  active  intellect.    In  this  instance,  ho 


SAMUEIi  TAYLOR  COLERIDGE- 


259 


had  the  same  defect,  derived  in  part  from  the  same  cause, 
as  a  contemporary,  one  of  the  idols  of  the  day,  more 
celebrated,  and  more  widely  celebrated,  than  Coleridge, 
but  far  his  inferior  in  power  and  compass  of  intellect.  I 
speak  of  Goethe  :  he  also  was  defective,  and  defective 
under  far  stronger  provocations  and  excitement,  in  patriotic 
feeling.  He  cared  little  for  Weimar — and  less  for  Ger- 
many. And  he  was,  thus  far,  much  below  Coleridge  — 
that  the  passion,  which  he  could  not  feel,  Coleridge  yet 
obliged  himself  practically  to  obey  in  all  things  which 
concerned  the  world ;  whereas,  Goethe  disowned  this 
passion  equally  in  his  acts  —  his  words  —  and  his  writings. 
Both  are  now  gone  —  Goethe  and  Coleridge  ;  both  are 
honored  by  those  who  knew  them,  and  by  multitudes  who 
did  not.  But  the  honors  of  Coleridge  are  perennial,  and 
will  annually  grow  more  verdant ;  whilst  from  those  of 
Goethe  every  generation  will  see  something  fall  away, 
until  posterity  will  wonder  at  the  subverted  idol,  whose 
basis  being  hollow  and  unsound,  will  leave  the  worship  of 
tneir  fathers  an  enigma  to  th^ir  descendants. 


260 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


CHAPTER  X. 

WILLIAM  WORDSWORTH. 

In  1807  it  was,  at  the  beginning  of  winter,  that  I  first 
saw  William  Wordsworth.  I  have  already  mentioned 
that  I  had  introduced  myself  to  his  notice  by  letter  as 
early  as  the  spring  of  1803.  To  this  hour  it  has  con- 
tinued, I  believe,  a  mystery  to  Wordsworth,  why  it  was 
that  I  suffered  an  interval  of  four  and  a  half  years  to  slip 
away  before  availing  myself  of  the  standing  invitation 
with  which  I  had  been  honored  to  the  poet's  house.  Very 
probably  he  accounted  for  this  delay  by  supposing  that 
the  new-born  liberty  of  an  Oxford  life,  with  its  multiplied 
enjoyments,  acting  upon  a  boy  just  emancipated  from 
the  restraints  of  a  school,  and,  in  one  hour,  elevated 
into  what  we  Oxonians  so  proudly  and  so  exclusively* 

*  At  the  universities  of  Oxford  and  Cambridge,  where  the  town  is 
viewed  as  a  mere  ministerial  appendage  to  the  numerous  colleges  — 
the  civic  Oxford,  for  instance,  existing  for  the  sake  of  the  academic 
Oxford,  and  not  vice  versa  —  it  has  naturally  happened  that  the 
students  honor  with  the  name  of  '  a  mauy^  him  only  who  wears  a  cap 
and  gown.  The  word  is  not  used  with  any  reference  to  physical 
powers,  or  to  age;  but  simply  to  the  final  object  for  which  the  places 
are  supposed  to  have  first  arisen,  and  to  maintain  themselves.  There 
is,  however,  a  ludicrous  effect  produced,  in  some  instances,  by  the 
use  of  this  term  in  contradistinguishing  parties.  *  Was  he  a  man  ?  * 
is  a  frequent  question;  and  as  frequent  in  the  mouth  of  a  stripling 
under  nineteen,  speaking,  perhaps,  of  a  huge,  elderly  tradesman  — 
*  Oh,  no  !  not  a  man  at  all.* 


WILLIAM  WORDSWORTH. 


261 


denominate  a  '  man,'  might  have  tempted  me  into  pur- 
suits alien  from  the  pure  intellectual  passions  which  had 
so  powerfully  mastered  my  youthful  heart  some  years 
before.  Extinguished  such  a  passion  could  not  be  ;  nor 
could  he  think,  if  remembering  the  fervor  with  which  I 
had  expressed  it,  the  sort  of  '  nympholepsy '  which  had 
seized  upon  me,  and  which,  in  some  imperfect  way,  I  had 
avowed  with  reference  to  the  very  origin  of  lakes  and 
mountains,  amongst  which  the  scenery  of  this  most  ori- 
ginal poetry  had  chiefly  grown  up  and  moved.  The 
very  names  of  the  ancient  hills  —  Fairfield,  Seat  Sandal, 
Helvellyn,  Blencathara,  Glaramara ;  of  the  sequestered 
glens  —  such  as  Borrowdale,  Martindale,  Mardale,  Was- 
dale,  and  Ennerdale  ;  but,  above  all,  the  shy  pastoral 
recesses,  not  gairishly  in  the  world's  eye,  like  Winder- 
mere, or  Derwentwater,  but  lurking  half  unknown  to  the 
traveller  of  that  day  —  Grasmere,  for  instance,  the  lovely 
abode  of  the  poet  himself,  solitary,  and  yet  sowed,  as  it 
were,  with  a  thin  diffusion  of  humble  dwellings  —  here  a 
scattering,  and  there  a  clustering,  as  in  the  starry  heavens 
—  sufficient  to  afford,  at  every  turn  and  angle,  human 
remembrances  and  memorials  of  time-honored  affections, 
or  of  passions,  (as  the  '  Churchyard  amongst  the  Moun- 
tains '  will  amply  demonstrate)  —  not  wanting  even  in 
scenic  and  tragical  interest :  —  these  were  so  many  local 
spells  upon  me,  equally  poetic  and  elevating  with  the 
Miltonic  names  of  Valdarno  and  Vallombrosa,  whilst,  in 
addition  to  that  part  of  their  power,  they  had  a  separate 
fascination,  under  the  anticipation  that  very  probably  I 
night  here  form  personal  ties  which  would  for  ever 
connect  me  with  their  sweet  solitudes  by  powers  deep  as 
life  and  awful  as  death. 

Oh !  sense  of  mysterious  pre-existence,  by  which, 
through  years  in  which  as  yet  a  stranger  to  these  valleys 


862  LITEKARY  REMINISCENCES. 

of  Westmoreland,  I  viewed  myself  as  a  pliant(/m-self — 
a  second  identity  projected  from  my  own  consciousness, 
and  already  living  amongst  them  !  —  how  was  it,  and  by 
what  prophetic  instinct,  that  already  I  said  to  myself  of- 
tentimes, when  chasing  day-dreams  along  the  pictures  of 
these  wild  mountainous  labyrinths,  which  as  yet  I  had  not 
traversed  —  Here,  in  some  distant  year,  I  shall  be  shaken 
with  love,  and  there  with  stormiest  grief?  —  whence  was 
it  that  sudden  revelations  came  upon  me,  like  the  drawing- 
up  of  a  curtain,  and  closing  again  as  rapidly,  of  scenes 
that  made  the  future  heaven  of  my  life  ?  —  and  how  was  it 
that  in  thought  I  was  and  yet  in  reality  was  not  a  denizen, 
already,  in  1803,  1804,  1805,  of  lakes  and  forest  lawnr 
which  I  never  saw  till  1807  ?  —  and  that,  by  a  prophetic 
instinct  of  the  heart,  I  rehearsed  and  lived  over,  as  it  were, 
in  vision,  those  chapters  of  my  life  which  have  carried 
with  them  the  weightiest  burthen  of  joy  and  sorrow,  and 
by  the  margin  of  those  very  lakes  and  hills  with  which  I 
prefigured  this  connection  ?  —  and,  in  short,  that  for  me, 
by  a  transcendent  privilege,  during  the  novitiate  of  my 
life,  most  truly  I  might  say  — 

*  In  To-day  already  walked  To-morrow  ?  * 

Deep  are  the  voices  which  seem  to  call,  deep  is  the  lesson 
which  would  be  taught  even  to  the  most  thoughtless  of 
men,  by  '  any  gladsome  field  of  earth '  which  he  maj 
chance  to  traverse,  if  (according  to  the  supposition  *  of 
Wordsworth)  that  field,  so  gay  to  him, 

*  Show  to  his  eye  an  image  of  the  pangs 
Which  it  hath  witnessed ;  render  back  an  echo 
Of  the  sad  ste})s  by  which  it  hath  been  trod.* 

*  See  the  divine  passage  in  *  The  Excursion,'  beginning  — 

*  Ah  !  what  a  lesson  for  a  thoughtless  man, 
If  any  gladsome  field  of  earth,'  &c. 


WILLIAM  WORDSWORTH. 


263 


But,  if  this  recall  of  the  real  be  affecting,  much  more  so  to 
me  is  this  aerial  and  shadowy  anticipation  of  the  future, 
when  looked  back  upon  from  far  distance  through  a  mul- 
titude of  years,  and  when  confirmed  for  the  great  outlines 
of  its  sketches  by  the  impassioned  experience  of  life. 
Why  I  should  have  done  so,  I  can  hardly  say ;  but  that  I 
did  —  even  before  I  had  visited  Grasmere,  and  whilst  it 
was  almost  certain,  from  the  sort  of  channel  in  which  my 
life  seemed  destined  to  flow,  that  London  would  be  the 
central  region  of  my  hopes  and  fears  —  even  then  I  turned 
to  Grasmere  and  its  dependencies  as  knit  up,  in  some 
way  as  yet  unknown,  with  my  future  destinies.  Of  this, 
were  it  not  that  it  would  wear  a  superstitious  air,  I  could 
mention  a  very  memorable  proof  from  the  records  of  my 
life  in  1804,  full  three  and  a  half  years  before  I  saw 
Grasmere.  However,  I  allude  to  that  fact  in  this  place  by 
way  of  showing  that  Oxford  had  not  weaned  my  thoughts 
from  the  northern  mountains  and  their  great  inhabitants  ; 
and  that  my  delay  was  due  to  anything  rather  than  to 
waning  interest.  On  the  contrary,  the  real  cause  of  my 
delay  was  the  too  great  profundity,  and  the  increasing 
profundity,  of  my  interest  in  this  regeneration  of  our 
national  poetry  ;  and  the  increasing  awe,  in  due  propor- 
tion to  the  decaying  thoughtlessness  of  boyhood,  which 
possessed  me  for  the  character  of  its  author.  So  far  from 
neglecting  Wordsworth,  it  is  a  fact  (and  Professor  Wilson 
—  who,  without  knowing  me  in  those  or  for  many  subse- 
quent years,  shared  my  feelings  towards  both  the  poetry 
and  the  poet  —  has  a  story  of  his  own  experience,  some- 
what similar,  to  report)  —  it  is  a  fact,  I  say,  that  twice  I 
had  undertaken  a  long  journey  expressly  for  the  purpose 
tf  paying  my  respects  to  Wordsworth  :  twice  I  came  so 
far  as  the  little  rustic  inn  (at  that  time  the  sole  inn  of  the 
aeighborhood)  at  Church  Coniston  —  the  village  which 


264 


LITERARY  EEMINISCENCES. 


stands  at  the  nortTi-western  angle  of  Coniston  Watci ;  and 
on  neither  occasion  could  I  summon  confidence  enough 
to  present  myself  before  him.  It  was  not  that  I  had  any 
want  of  proper  boldness  for  facing  the  most  numerous 
company  of  a  mixed  or  ordinary  character :  reserved 
indeed  I  was,  and  too  much  so,  perhaps  even  shy  —  from 
the  character  of  my  mind,  so  profoundly  meditative,  and 
the  character  of  my  life,  so  profoundly  sequestered  :  but 
still,  from  counteracting  causes,  I  was  not  deficient  in  a 
reasonable  self-confidence  towards  the  world  generally. 
But  the  very  image  of  Wordsworth,  as  I  prefigured  it  to 
my  own  planet-struck  eye,  crushed  my  faculties  as  before 
Elijah  or  St.  Paul.  Twice,  as  I  have  said,  did  I  advance 
as  far  as  the  Lake  of  Coniston,  which  is  about  eight  miles 
from  the  church  of  Grasmere,  and  once  I  absolutely  went 
forwards  from  Coniston  to  the  very  gorge  of  Hammerscar, 
from  which  the  whole  vale  of  Grasmere  suddenly  breaks 
upon  the  view  in  a  style  of  almost  theatrical  surprise, 
with  its  lovely  valley  stretching  in  the  distance,  the  lake 
lying  immediately  below,  with  its  solemn  boat-like  island 
of  five  acres  in  size,  seemingly  floating  on  its  surface ;  its 
exquisite  outline  on  the  opposite  shore,  revealing  all  its 
little  bays"^'  and  wild  sylvan  margin,  feathered  to  the  edge 
with  wild  flowers  and  ferns.  In  one  quarter,  a  little 
wood,  stretching  for  about  half  a  mile  towards  the  outlet 
of  the  lake,  more  directly  in  opposition  to  the  spectator  ; 
a  few  green  fields ;  and  beyond  them,  just  two  bowshots 
from  the  water,  a  little  white  cottage  gleaming  from  the 
midst  of  trees  with  a  vast  and  seemingly  never-ending 
series  of  ascents,  rising  above  it  to  the  height  of  more 

♦  All  which  inimitable  graces  of  nature  have,  by  the  hands  of 
mechanic  art,  by  solid  masonry,  by  whitewashing,  &c.,  been  extermi* 
nated  as  a  growth  of  weeds  and  nuisances  for  thirty  good  years.  — • 
Jlugmt  17,  1853. 


WILLIAM  WORDSWORTH. 


265 


than  three  thousand  feet.  That  little  cottage  was  Words- 
worth's from  the  time  of  his  marriage,  and  earlier — in 
fact,  from  the  beginning  of  the  century  to  the  year  1808. 
Afterwards,  for  many  a  year,  it  was  mine.  Catching  one 
hasty  glimpse  of  this  loveliest  of  landscapes,  I  retreated 
like  a  guilty  thing,  for  fear  I  might  be  surprised  by  Words- 
worth, and  then  returned  faint-heartedly  to  Coniston,  and 
so  to  Oxford,  re,  infectd. 

This  was  in  1806.  And  thus  far,  from  mere  excess  of 
nervous  distrust  in  my  own  powers  for  sustaining  a  con- 
versation with  Wordsworth,  I  had,  for  nearly  five  years, 
shrunk  from  a  meeting  for  which,  beyond  all  things  under 
heaven,  I  longed.  These,  the  reader  will  say,  were 
foolish  feelings.  Why,  yes ;  perhaps  they  were :  but 
they  had  a  laudable  foundation  ;  for  I  carried  my  modesty 
to  a  laughable  excess  undoubtedly ;  but  yet  it  loas  mod- 
esty which  co-operated  with  other  feelings  to  produce  my 
foolish  panic.  I  had  lived  in  profounder  solitude  than 
can  have  fallen  to  the  lot  of  many  people,  which  arose 
from  the  unusual  defect  of  sympathy  I  found  in  all 
around  me  ;  and  this  solitude  gave  a  preternatural  depth 
to  my  master  feelings,  which  originally  were  deep  enough, 
and,  to  speak  phrenologically,  the  organ  of  veneration 
must  have  received  an  inordinate  development  in  my  case. 
However,  say  what  one  can  for  it,  no  doubt  my  conduct 
was  very  absurd  ;  and  I  began  to  think  so  myself.  I  fan- 
cied continually  a  plain,  honest,  old  relative  saying  to  me 
—  '  Let  the  man  be  a  god  even,  he  will  show  himself 
very  little  of  a  good  one  if  he  is  not  satisfied  with  a  devo- 
tion such  as  yours.  You  ofier  him  almost  a  blamable 
adoration.  What  more  can  he  require  ?  And  if  more  h^^ 
does  require,  hang  me  if  I  would't  think  myself  too  gooa 
or  any  man's  scorn  ;  and,  after  one  trial  of  it,  I  would 
wish  him  good  morning  for  ever.'  Still  I  witnessed  a  casa 


IITERARY  KEMINISCENCES. 


wliere  a  kind  of  idol  had,  after  all,  rejected  an  idolator 
that  did  not  offer  a  splendid  triumph  to  his  pride ;  and 
with  the  additional  cruelty  of  slighting  this  worshipper  in 
behalf  of  one  more  brilliant,  who  seemed  in  great  doubt 
whether  he  should  admire  or  not.  And,  although  I  thought 
better  of  Mr.  Wordsworth's  moral  nature  than  to  suppose 
it  possible  for  him  to  err  in  this  extent,  or  even  with  this 
kind  of  insolence,  yet  I  could  not  reconcile  myself  to  the 
place  of  an  humble  admirer,  valued,  perhaps,  for  the  right 
direction  of  his  feelings,  but  practically  neglected  in  behalf 
of  some  more  gifted  companion,  who  might  have  the 
power  (which  much  I  feared  that  I  should  never  have)  of 
talking  to  him  on  something  like  equal  terms,  as  respected 
the  laws  and  principles  of  poetry.  I  could  bear  well 
enough  to  be  undervalued,  or  even  openly  scorned ;  for, 
said  I  to  myself,  it  is  the  lot  of  every  man  in  this  world  to 
be  scorned  by  somebody  ;  and  also,  to  balance  that  mis- 
fortune, every  man  has  a  chance  of  one  worshipper.  '  I,' 
says  Sir  Andrew  Aguecheek  — '  I  was  adored  once.*  Yes, 
even  Aguecheek  had  his  one  adorer  ;  and  there  is  not  that 
immeasurable  fool  in  this  world,  but  that  (according  to 
La  Fontaine's  consolatory  doctrine)  he  has  a  fair  chance 
for  finding  '  unplus  grand  sot  que  hiimeme,^ 

But  with  all  this  equanimity  in  my  expectation  and 
demands,  philosophically  as  I  could  have  reconciled 
myself  to  contempt,  there  was  a  limit.  People  there 
were  in  this  world  whose  respect  I  could  not  dispense 
with  :  people  also  there  Jiave  been  in  this  world  (alas ! 
alas ! )  whose  love  was  to  me  no  less  indispensable. 
Have  it  I  must,  or  life  would  have  had  no  value  in  my 
eyes.  Was  I  then  so  deficient  in  conversational  power 
that  I  could  not  hope  to  acquit  myself  respectably  ?  In 
that  respect,  it  is  a  singularity  in  which  (if  I  may  presume, 
oven  for  a  defect,  to  compare  myself  with  so  great  a  man) 


WILLIAM  WORDSTVOBTH. 


267 


I  resembled  Wordsworth  —  namely,  tliat  in  early  youth  I 
labored  under  a  peculiar  embarrassment  and  penury  of 
words,  when  I  sought  to  convey  my  thoughts  adequately 
'ipon  interesting  subjects  :  neither  was  it  words  only  that  I 
wanted :  but  I  could  not  unravel,  I  could  not  even  make 
perfectly  conscious  to  myself,  or  properly  arrange  the 
subsidiary  thoughts  into  which  one  leading  thought  often 
radiates  ;  or,  at  least,  I  could  not  do  this  with  anything 
like  the  rapidity  requisite  for  conversation.  I  labored  like 
a  Sybil  instinct  with  the  burden  of  prophetic  wo,  as  often 
as  I  found  myself  dealing  with  any  topic  in  which  the 
understanding  combined  with  deep  feelings  to  suggest 
mixed  and  tangled  thoughts :  and  thus  partly  —  partly 
also  from  my  invincible  habit  of  reverie  —  at  that  era  of 
my  life,  I  had  a  most  distinguished  talent  'pour  le  silence,^ 
Wordsworth,  from  something  of  the  same  causes,  suffered 
(by  his  own  report  to  myself)  at  the  same  age  from  pretty 
much  the  same  infirmity.  And  yet,  in  more  advanced 
years  —  probably  about  twenty-eight  or  thirty  —  both  of 
us  acquired  a  remarkable  fluency  in  the  art  of  unfolding 
our  thoughts  colloquially.  However,  at  that  period  my 
deficiencies  were  what  I  have  described.  And  after  all, 
though  I  had  no  absolute  cause  for  anticipating  contempt, 
I  was  so  far  right  in  my  fears,  that  since  that  time  I  have 
had  occasion  to  perceive  a  worldly  tone  of  sentiment  in 
Wordsworth,  not  less  than  in  Mrs.  Hannah  More  and  other 
literary  people,  by  which  they  were  led  to  set  a  higher 
value  upon  a  limited  respect  from  a  person  high  in  the 
world's  esteem,  than  upon  the  most  lavish  spirit  oi 
devotion  from  an  obscure  quarter.  Now,  in  that  point, 
my  feelings  are  far  otherwise  ;  and,  though  it  is  praising 
myself  to  say  so,  yet  say  it  I  must,  because  it  is  mere 
truth  —  that,  if  a  fool  were  so  far  to  honor  me  as  to  profess, 
in  Sir  A^ndrew  Aguecheek's  phrase,  e^en  to  '  adore '  mi 


268 


XITERAEY  REMINISCENCES. 


—  yes,  tliough  it  were  Sir  Andrew  himself — 1  should 
say,  '  My  poor  fool !  thy  adoration  will  do  me  but  little 
good  in  this  world ;  yet,  to  know  that  thy  whole  heart's 
wealth  is  given  up  to  me,  that  forces  me  to  value  thy 
homage  more  than  I  would  that  of  Solomon  in  all  his 
glory.' 

Meantime,  the  world  went  on ;  events  kept  moving : 
and,  amongst  them,  in  the  course  of  1807,  occurred  the 
event  of  Mr.  Coieridge's  return  to  England  from  his 
official  station  in  the  Governor's  family  at  Malta ;  my 
introduction  to  his  acquaintance  at  Bridgewater,  where  he 
was  then  (summer  of  1807)  visiting,  together  with  his 
family,  amongst  old  Somersetshire  friends ;  his  subsequent 
journey  to  Bristol,  near  which  (at  the  Hot  Wells)  I  was 
then  staying  with  a  female  relation ;  and,  finally,  upon 
discovering  that  he  was  anxious  to  put  his  wife  and  chil- 
dren under  some  friendly  escort,  on  their  return  homewards 
to  Keswick,  (he  himself  being  summoned  to  execute  an 
engagement  to  lecture  at  the  Royal  Institution  during  the 
coming  winter,)  I  offered  to  unite  with  Mrs.  Coleridge  in 
a  post-chaise  to  the  north.  My  offer  was  readily  accepted, 
and,  at  the  latter  end  of  October,  we  set  forwards  —  Mrs. 
Coleridge,  viz.  with  her  two  surviving  sons  —  Hartley, 
aged  nine,  the  oldest ;  Derwent,  about  seven  —  her 
beautiful  little  daughter,^^'  about  five  ;  and,  finally,  myself. 
Going  by  the  direct  route  through  Gloucester,  Bridge- 

*  That  most  accomplished,  and  to  Coleridge  most  pious  daughter, 
whose  recent  death  afflicted  so  very  many  who  knew  her  only  by 
her  writings.  She  had  married  her  cousin,  Mr.  Sergeant  Coleridge, 
and  in  that  way  retained  her  illustrious  maiden  name  as  a  wife.  At 
tfcventeen,  when  last  1  saw  her,  she  was  the  most  perfect  of  all  pen- 
Bive,  nun-like,  intellectual  beauties  that  I  have  seen  in  real  breathing 
life.  The  upper  parts  of  her  face  were  verily  divine.  See,  for  ais 
artist's  opinion,  the  Life  of  that  admirable  man  Collins,  by  his  son. 


WILLIAM  WORDSWORTH. 


269 


fvater,  (fee.  on  the  third  day  we  reached  Liverpool,  where  I 
took  up  my  quarters  at  a  hotel,  whilst  Mrs.  Coleridge  paid 
a  visit  of  a  few  days  to  a  very  interesting  family,  friends 
of  Southey.  These  were  the  Misses  Koster,  daughters  of 
an  English  gold  merchant  of,  celebrity,  who  had  recently 
quitted  Portugal  on  the  approach  of  the  French  army 
under  Junot.  Mr.  Koster  did  me  the  honor  to  call  at  ray 
quarters,  and  invite  me  to  his  house ;  an  invitation  which 
I  very  readily  accepted,  and  had  thus  an  opportunity  of 
becoming  acquainted  with  a  family  the  most  accomplished 
I  had  ever  known.  At  dinner,  there  appeared  only  the 
family  party,  several  daughters,  and  one  son,  a  fine  young 
man  of  twenty,  but  who  was  consciously  dying  of  asthma. 
Mr.  Koster,  the  head  of  the  family,  was  distinguished  for 
his  good  sense  and  practical  information ;  but,  in  Liver- 
pool, still  more  so  by  his  eccentric  and  obstinate  denial  of 
certain  notorious  events ;  in  particular,  he  denied  that  any 
such  battle  as  Talavera  had  ever  been  fought,  and  had  a 
large  wager  depending  upon  the  result.  His  house  was 
the  resort  of  distinguished  foreigners;  and,  on  the  first 
evening  of  my  dining  there,  as  well  as  afterwards,  I  there 
met,  for  the  first  time  and  for  the  last,  that  marvel  of 
women,  Madame  Catalini.  I  had  heard  her  repeatedly ; 
but  never  before  been  near  enough  to  see  her  smile  and 
converse  —  even  to  be  honored  with  a  smile  myself.  She 
and  Lady  Hamilton  were  the  most  effectively  brilliant 
women  I  ever  saw.  However,  on  this  occasion  the  Misses 
Koster  outshone  even  la  Catalini ;  to  her  they  talked  in 
the  most  fluent  Italian ;  to  some  foreign  men,  in  Por-u- 
j^uese ;  to  one  in  French ;  and  to  most  of  the  party  m 
English ;  and  each,  by  turns,  seemed  to  be  their  native 
tongue.  Nor  did  they  shrink,  even  in  the  presence  of 
the  mighty  enchantress  and  syren,  ^rom  exhibiting  their 
musical  skill. 


270 


LITERAKY  EEMINISCENCES- 


From  Liverpool,  after  about  a  week's  delay,  we  pursued . 
our  journey  n  ^rth wards.  We  had  slept  on  the  first  day 
at  Lancaster.  Consequently,  at  the  rate  of  motion  which 
then  prevailed  throughout  England  —  which,  however 
was  rarely  equalled  on  that  road,  where  all  things  were  in 
arrear  by  comparison  with  the  eastern  and  southern  roads 
of  the  kingdom  —  we  naturally  enough  found  ourselves 
about  three  o'clock  in  the  afternoon,  at  Ambleside, 
fourteen  miles  to  the  north  of  Kendal,  and  thirty-six  from 
our  sleeping  quarters.  There,  for  the  last  time,  we 
stopped  to  change  horses,  a  ceremony  which  then  took 
half  an  hour ;  and,  about  four  o'clock,  we  found  ourselves 
on  the  summit  of  the  White  Moss,  a  hill  which  rises 
between  the  second  and  third  mile-stones  on  the  stage 
from  Ambleside  to  Keswick,  and  which  then  retarded  the 
traveller's  advance  by  a  full  fifteen  minutes,  but  is  now 
evaded  by  a  lower  line  of  road.  In  ascending  this  hill, 
from  weariness  of  moving  so  slowly,  I,  with  the  two 
Coleridges,  had  alighted ;  and,  as  we  all  chose  to  stretch 
our  legs  by  running  down  the  hill,  we  had  left  the  chaise 
behind  us,  and  had  even  lost  the  sound  of  the  wheels  at 
times,  when  all  at  once  we  came,  at  an  abrupt  turn  of 
the  road,  in  sight  of  a  white  cottage,  with  two  solemn 
yew-trees  breaking  the  glare  of  its  white  walls.  A  sudden 
shock  seized  me  on  recognizing  this  cottage,  of  which,  in 
the  previous  year,  I  had  gained  a  momentary  glimpse 
from  Hammerscar,  on  the  opposite  side  of  the  lake.  I 
paused,  and  felt  my  old  panic  returning  upon  me ;  bu 
just  then,  as  if  to  take  away  all  doubt  upon  the  subject,  I 
saw  Hartley  Coleridge,  who  had  gained  upon  me  con- 
tiderably  during  my  pause  of  hesitation,  suddenly  turn  in 
at  a  garden  gate  ;  and,  just  then,  the  chaise,  which  had 
been  rattling  furiously  down  the  descent,  according  tc 
\he  invanable  practice  of  Westmoreland  drivers,  (for  iv 


WILLIAM  WOKDSWORTH. 


271 


Weatmoreland  they  never  lock  down  the  steepest  descents^ 
ft.nl  therefore  rightly  keep  up  their  horses  at  a  flying 
gallop,)  suddenly  turned  a  corner  of  the  road  and  came 
into  sight :  at  the  same  moment  Mrs.  Coleridge  waved  her 
hand  from  one  of  the  front  windows ;  and  the  direction  of 
this  motion  to  the  right,  at  once  confirmed  me  in  my 
belief  that  here  at  last  we  had  reached  our  port ;  that  this 
little  cottage  was  tenanted  by  that  man  whom,  of  all  the 
men  from  the  beginning  of  time,  I  most  fervently  desired 
to  see ;  that,  in  less  than  a  minute,  I  should  meet  Words- 
worth face  to  face.  Coleridge  was  of  opinion  that,  if  a 
man  were  really  and  consciously  to  see  an  apparition  — 
supposing,  I  mean,  the  case  to  be  a  physical  possibility 
that  a  spiritual  essence  should  be  liable  to  the  action  of 
material  organs  —  in  such  circumstances  death  would  be 
the  inevitable  result ;  and,  if  so,  the  wish  which  we  hear  so 
commonly  expressed  for  such  experience  is  as  thoughtless 
as  that  of  Semele  in  the  Grecian  mythology,  so  natural  in 
a  female,  that  her  lover  should  visit  her  en  grand  costume^ 
and  '  with  his  tail  on  ^  —  presumptuous  ambition,  that 
unexpectedly  wrought  its  own  ruinous  chastisement ! 
Judged  by  Coleridge's  test,  my  situation  could  not  have 
been  so  terrific  as  his  who  anticipates  a  ghost  —  for,  cer- 
tainly, I  survived  this  meeting ;  but,  at  that  instant,  it 
seemed  pretty  much  the  same  to  my  own  feelings. 

Never  before  or  since  can  I  reproach  myself  with 
having  trembled  at  the  approaching  presence  of  any 
creature  that  is  born  of  woman,  excepting  only,  for  once 
ir  twice  in  my  life,  woman  herself;  now,  however,  I  did 
vremble ;  and  I  forgot,  what  in  no  other  circumstances  I 
could  have  forgotten,  to  stop  for  the  coming  up  of  the 
chaise,  that  I  might  be  ready  to  hand  Mrs.  Coleridge  out. 
Had  Charlemagne  and  all  his  Peerage  been  behind  me, 
cr  CaEsar  and  his  equipage,  or  Death  on  his  pale  hDrse, 


272 


LITERARY  REMIJ^TISCENCES. 


I  should  have  forgotten  them  at  that  moment  of  intense 
expectation,  and  of  eyes  fascinated  to  what  lay  before  me, 
or  what  might  in  a  moment  appear.  Through  the  little 
gate  I  pressed  forward  ;  ten  steps  beyond  it  lay  the  prin- 
cipal door  of  the  house.  To  this,  no  longer  clearly 
conscious  of  my  own  feelings,  I  passed  on  rapidly ;  1 
heard  a  step,  a  voice,  and,  like  a  flash  of  lightning,  I  saw 
the  figure  emerge  of  a  tallish  man,  who  held  out  his  hand, 
and  saluted  me  with  the  most  cordial  manner,  and  the 
warmest  expression  of  friendly  welcome,  that  it  is  possible 
to  imagine.  The  chaise,  however,  drawing  up  to  the  gate 
at  that  moment,  he  (and  there  needed  no  Roman  nomen- 
clator,  to  tell  me  that  this  he,  the  owner  of  this  noble 
countenance,  was  Wordsworth,)  felt  himself  summoned  as 
master  of  the  hospitalities  on  the  occasion,  to  advance 
and  receive  Mrs.  Coleridge.  I,  therefore,  stunned  almost 
with  the  actual  accomplishment  of  a  catastrophe  so  long 
anticipated  and  so  long  postponed,  mechanically  went 
forward  into  the  house.  A  little  semi-vestibule  between 
two  doors  prefaced  the  entrance  into  what  might  be 
considered  the  principal  room  of  the  cottage.  It  was  an 
oblong  square,  not  above  eight  and  a  half  feet  high,  six- 
teen feet  long,  and  twelve  broad ;  very  prettily  wainscoted 
from  the  floor  to  the  ceiling  with  dark  polished  oak, 
slightly  embellished  with  carving.  One  window  there 
was  —  a  perfect  and  unpretending  cottage  window,  with 
little  diamond  panes,  embowered,  at  almost  every  season 
of  the  year,  with  roses  ;  and,  in  the  summer  and  autumn, 
with  a  profusion  of  jessamine  and  other  fragrant  shrubs. 
From  the  exuberant  luxuriance  of  the  vegetation  around 
't,  and  from  the  dark  hue  of  the  wainscoting,  this  window, 
though  tolerably  large,  did  not  furnish  a  very  powerful 
light  to  one  who  entered  from  the  open  air.  However,  I 
law  sufliciently  to  be  aware  of  two  ladies  just  entering  the 


WILLIAM  WORDSWORTH. 


273 


room,  from  a  doorway  opening  upon  a  little  gt&:rcase 
The  foremost,  a  tall  young  woman,  with  the  most  winning 
expression  of  benignity  upon  her  features  that  I  had  ever 
beheld,  made  a  slight  curtsey,  and  advanced  to  me,  pre- 
senting her  hand  with  so  frank  an  air  that  all  embarrass- 
ment must  have  fled  in  a  moment,  before  the  native  good- 
ness of  her  manner.  This  wa3  Mrs.  Wordsworth,  cousin 
of  the  poet ;  and,  for  the  last  five  years  or  more,  his  wife. 
She  was  now  mother  of  two  children,  a  son  and  a  daugh- 
ter ;  and  she  furnished  a  remarkable  proof  how  possible 
it  is  for  a  woman  neither  handsome  nor  even  comely, 
according  to  the  rigor  of  criticism  —  nay,  generally  pro- 
nounced very  plain  —  to  exercise  all  the  practical  power 
and  fascination  of  beauty,  through  the  mere  compensatory 
charms  of  sweetness  all  but  angelic,  of  simplicity  the  mosV 
entire,  womanly  self-respect,  and  purity  of  heart  speaking 
through  all  her  looks,  acts,  and  movements.  Words,  I 
was  going  to  have  added  ;  but  her  words  were  few.  In 
reality,  she  talked  so  little,  that  Mr.  Slave-Trade  Clarkson 
used  to  say  of  her  that  she  could  only  say  '  God  lless 
you  !  '  Certainly  her  intellect  was  not  of  an  active  order ; 
but,  in  a  quiescent,  reposing,  meditative  way,  she  ap- 
peared always  to  have  a  genial  enjoyment  from  her  own 
thoughts ;  and  it  would  have  been  strange  indeed  if  she, 
who  enjoyed  such  eminent  advantages  of  training,  from 
the  daily  society  of  her  husband  and  his  sister,  not  only 
hearing  the  best  parts  of  English  literature  daily  read,  or 
quoted  by  short  fragments,  but  also  hearing  them  very 
often  critically  discussed  in  a  style  of  great  originality  and 
truth,  and  by  the  light  of  strong  poetic  feeling  —  stiange 
it  would  have  been  had  any  person,  though  dull  as  the 
weeds  of  Lethe  in  the  native  constitution  of  his  mind, 
foiled  to  acquire  some  power  of  judging  for  himself,  and 
Dutting  forth  some  functions  of  activity.  But  undoubtedly 
18 


274 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


that  was  u^t  her  element :  to  feel  and  to  enjoy  in  a  lux- 
urious repose  of  mind  —  there  was  her  forte  and  her 
peculiar  privilege  ;  and  how  much  better  this  was  adapted 
to  her  husband's  taste,  how  much  more  adapted  to  up- 
hold the  comfort  of  his  daily  life,  than  a  blue-stocking 
loquacity,  or  even  a  legitimate  talent  for  discussion  and 
analytic  skill,  may  be  inferred  from  his  celebrated  verses, 
beginning  — 

*  She  was  a  phantom  of  delight 

When  first  she  gleam'd  upon  my  sight; ' 

and  ending  with  this  matchless  winding  up  of  an  intel- 
lectual homage,  involving  a  description  of  an  almost  ideal 
wife  — 

*  A  perfect  woman,  nobly  plann'd 
To  warn,  to  comfort,  to  command; 
And  yet '  — 

going  back  to  a  previous  thought,  and  resuming  a  leading 
impression  of  the  whole  character  — 

*  And  yet  a  spirit  too,  and  bright 
With  something  of  an  angel  light.' 

From  these  verses,  I  say,  it  may  be  inferred  what  were 
the  qualities  which  won  Wordsworth's  admiration  in  a 
wife ;  for  these  verses  were  written  upon  Mary  Hutchin- 
son, his  own  cousin,  and  his  wife  ;  and  not  written,  as 
Coleridge's  moveable  verses  upon  '  Sara,^  for  some  for- 
gotten original  Sara,  and  subsequently  transferred  to  every 
other  Sara  who  came  across  his  path.  Once  for  all,*^'  these 
exquisite  lines  were  dedicated  to  Mrs.  Wordsworth ;  were 
understood  to  describe  her  —  to  have  been  prompted  by 

*  Once  for  all,  I  say  —  on  recollecting  that  Coleridge's  verses  to 
Sara  were  made  transferable  to  any  Sara  who  reigned  at  the  time. 
At  least  three  Saras  appropriated  them  ;  all  three  long  since  in  tbfl 
grave. 


WILLIAM  WORDSWOHTH. 


275 


the  feminine  graces  of  her  character  ;  hers  they  are,  and 
will  remain  for  ever.  To  these,  therefore,  I  may  refei 
the  reader  for  an  idea,  by  infinite  degrees  more  powerful 
and  vivid  than  I  could  give  him,  of  what  was  most  im- 
portant in  the  partner  and  second  self  of  the  poet.  And 
I  shall  add  to  this  abstract  of  her  moral  portrait  these  few 
concluding  traits  of  her  appearance  in  a  physical  sense. 
She  was  tall  —  that  I  have  already  said  ;  her  figure  was 
good  —  except  that,  for  my  taste,  it  was  rather  too  slender, 
and  so  it  always  continued.  In  complexion  she  was  fair  ; 
and  there  was  something  peculiarly  pleasing  even  in  this 
accident  of  the  skin,  for  it  was  accompanied  by  an  ani- 
mated expression  of  health,  a  blessing  which,  in  fact,  she 
possessed  uninterruptedly,  very  pleasing  in  itself,  and  also 
a  powerful  auxiliary  of  that  smiling  benignity  which  con- 
stituted the  greatest  attraction  of  her  person.  '  Her  eyes  * 
~  the  reader  may  already  know  — '  her  eyes  '  — 

*  Like  stars  of  twilight  fair  ; 
Like  twilight,  too,  her  dark  brown  hair ; 
But  all  things  else  about  her  drawn 
From  May-time  and  the  cheerful  dawn.' 

But  strange  it  is  to  tell  that,  in  these  eyes  of  vesper  gen- 
tleness, there  was  a  considerable  obliquity  of  vision  ;  and 
much  beyond  that  slight  obliquity  which  is  often  supposed 
to  be  an  attractive  foible  of  the  countenance  :  and  yet, 
though  it  ought  to  have  been  displeasing  or  repulsive,  in 
fact  it  was  not.  Indeed  all  faults,  had  they  been  ten 
times  more  and  greater,  would  have  been  swallowed  up 
or  neutralized  by  that  supreme  expression  of  her  features, 
to  the  intense  unity  of  which  every  lineament  in  the  fixed 
parts,  and  every  undulation  in  the  moving  parts,  or  play 
of  her  countenance,  concurred  —  viz.  a  sunny  benignity 
—  a  radiant  gracefulness  —  such  as  in  this  world  I  never 
saw  equalled  or  approached. 


276 


LITEEARY  REMINISCENCES. 


Here,  tlien,  "the  reader  lias  a  sketch  of  Mrs.  Words, 
worth.  Immediately  behind  her,  moved  a  lady,  much 
shorter,  much  slighter,  and  perhaps,  in  all  other  respects, 
as  different  from  her  in  personal  characteristics  as  could 
have  been  wished,  for  the  most  effective  contrast.  '  Her 
face  was  of  Egyptian  brown ;  '  rarely,  in  a  woman  of 
English  birth,  had  I  seen  a  more  determinate  gipsy  tan. 
Her  eyes  wf re  not  soft,  as  Mrs.  Wordsworth's,  nor  were 
they  fierce  oi  bold ;  but  they  were  wild  and  startling,  and 
hurried  in  their  motion.  Her  manner  w^as  warm  and  even 
ardent ;  her  sensibility  seemed  constitutionally  deep  ;  and 
some  subtle  fire  of  impassioned  intellect  apparently  burned 
within  her,  which,  being  alternately  pushed  forward  into 
a  conspicuous  expression  by  the  irrepressible  instincts  of 
her  temperament,  and  then  immediately  checked,  in  obe- 
dience to  the  decorum  of  her  sex  and  age,  and  her 
maidenly  condition,  (for  she  had  rejected  all  offers  of 
marriage,  out  of  pure  sisterly  regard  to  her  brother  and 
his  children,)  gave  to  her  whole  demeanor  and  to  her 
conversation,  an  air  of  embarrassment  and  even  of  self- 
conflict,  that  was  sometimes  distressing  to  witness.  Even 
her  very  utterance  and  enunciation  often,  or  rather  gen- 
erally, suffered  in  point  of  clearness  and  steadiness,  from 
the  agitation  of  her  excessive  organic  sensibility,  and, 
perhaps,  from  some  morbid  irritability  of  the  nerves.  At 
times,  the  self-counteraction  and  self-baffling  of  her  feel- 
ings caused  her  even  to  stammer,  and  so  determinately 
to  stammer,  that  a  stranger  who  should  have  seen  her  and 
quitted  her  in  that  state  of  feeling,  would  have  certainly 
set  her  down  for  one  plagued  with  that  infirmity  of 
speech,  as  distressingly  as  Charles  Lamb  himself.  This 
was  Miss  Wordsworth,  the  only  sister  of  the  poet  —  his 
'  Dorothy ;  '  who  naturally  owed  so  much  to  the  life-long 
Intercourse  with  her  great  brother,  in  his  most  solitary 


WILLIAM  ^VORDSWOHTII. 


277 


and  sequestered  years  ;  but,  on  the  other  hand,  to  whom 
he  has  acknowledged  obligations  of  the  piofoundest  na- 
ture ;  and,  in  particular,  this  mighty  one,  through  which 
we  also,  the  admirers  and  the  worshippers  through  every 
age  of  this  great  poet,  are  become  t  qually  her  debtors  — 
that  whereas  the  intellect  of  Wordsworth  was,  by  its 
original  tendencies,  too  stern  —  too  austere  —  too  much 
enamored  of  an  ascetic  harsh  sublimity,  she  it  was  —  the 
lady  who  paced  by  his  side  continually  through  sylvan 
ind  mountain  tracks,  in  Highland  glens,  and  in  the  dim 
recesses  of  German  charcoal-burners  —  that  first  couched 
his  eye  to  the  sense  of  beauty  —  humanized  him  by  the 
gentler  charities,  and  engrafted,  with  her  delicate  female 
touch,  those  graces  upon  the  ruder  growths  of  his  nature, 
which  have  since  clothed  the  forest  of  his  genius  with  a 
foliage  corresponding  in  loveliness  and  beauty  to  the 
strength  of  its  boughs  and  the  massiveness  of  its  trunks. 
The  greatest  deductions  from  Miss  Wordsworth's  attrac- 
tions, and  from  the  exceeding  interest  which  surrounded 
her  in  right  of  her  character,  her  history,  and  the  relation 
which  she  fulfilled  towards  her  brother,  was  the  glancing 
quickness  of  her  motions,  and  other  circumstances  in  hel 
deportment,  (such  as  her  stooping  attitude  when  walking,) 
which  gave  an  ungraceful,  and  even  an  unsexual  character 
to  her  appearance  when  out  of  doors.  She  did  not  culti- 
vate the  graces  which  preside  over  the  person  and  its 
carriage.  But,  on  the  other  hand,  she  was  a  person  of 
very  remarkable  endowments  intellectually  ;  and,  in  addi- 
tion to  the  other  great  services  which  she  rendered  to  her 
brother,  this  I  may  mention,  as  greater  than  all  the  rest, 
and  it  was  one  which  equally  operated  to  the  benefit  of 
every  casual  companion  in  a  walk  —  viz.  the  exceeding 
sympathy,  always  ready  and  always  profound,  by  which 
♦he  made  all  that  one  could  tell  her,  all  that  one  could 


278 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


describe,  all  that  one  could  quote  from  a  foreign  authot; 
reverberate  as  it  were  d  plusieurs  reprises,  to  one's  own 
feelings  by  the  manifest  impression  it  made  upon  her. 
The  pulses  of  light  are  not  more  quick  or  more  inevitable 
in  their  flow  and  undulation,  than  were  the  answering  and 
echoing  movements  of  her  sympathizing  attention.  Her 
knowledge  of  literature  was  irregular,  and  not  systemati- 
cally built  up.  She  was  content  to  be  ignorant  of  many 
things  ;  but  what  she  knew  and  had  really  mastered,  lay 
where  it  could  not  be  disturbed  —  in  the  temper  of  her 
own  most  fervid  heart.  In  whatever  I  say  or  shall  say  of 
Miss  Wordsworth,  the  reader  may  understand  me  to  have 
the  entire  sanction  and  concurrence  of  Professor  Wilson. 
We  both  knew  Miss  Wordsworth  well ;  and  we  heartily 
agreed  in  admiring  her. 

Such  were  the  two  ladies,  who,  with  himself  and  two 
children,  and  at  that  time  one  servant,  composed  the 
poet's  household.  They  were  both  somewhere  about 
twenty-eight  years  old  ;  and  if  the  reader  inquires  about 
the  single  point  which  I  have  left  untouched  in  their  por- 
traiture —  viz.  the  style  of  their  manners  —  I  may  say 
that  it  was  in  some  points,  naturally  of  a  plain  household 
simplicity,  but  everyway  pleasing,  unaffected,  and  (as 
respects  Mrs.  Wordsworth)  even  dignified.  Few  persons 
had  seen  so  little  as  this  lady  of  the  world.  She  had  seen 
nothing  of  high  life,  for  she  had  seen  none  at  all.  Conse- 
quently, she  was  unacquainted  with  the  conventional  modes 
of  behavior,  prescribed  in  particular  situations  by  high 
breeding.  But,  as  these  modes  are  little  more  than  the 
product  of  dispassionate  good  sense,  applied  to  the  circum- 
stances of  the  case,  it  is  surprising  how  few  deficiencies 
are  perceptible,  even  to  the  most  vigilant  eye  —  or,  at 
l^ast,  essential  deficiencies  —  in  the  general  demeanor  of 
fcny  unaffected  young  woman,  acting  habitually  under  a 


WILLIAM  WORDSWORTH. 


279 


sense  jf  sexual  dignity,  courtesy,  pure  tastes,  ana  elegant 
enjoyments,  assisted  by  the  daily  counsel  and  revision  of 
a  masculine  intellect,  in  the  person  of  a  brother  or  a  hus- 
band. Miss  Wordsworth  had  seen  most  of  life,  and  even 
of  good  company ;  for  she  had  lived,  when  quite  a  girl, 
under  the  protection  of  a  near  relation  at  Windsor,  who 
was  a  personal  favorite  of  the  royal  family,  and  especially 
of  George  III.  Consequently  she  ought  to  have  been  the 
more  polished  of  the  two  ;  and  yet,  from  greater  natural 
aptitudes  for  refinement  of  manner  in  her  sister-in-law,  and 
partly,  perhaps,  from  her  more  quiet  and  subdued  manner. 
Mrs.  Wordsworth  would  have  been  pronounced  the  more 
ladylike  person. 

From  the  interest  which  attaches  to  every  person  so  near- 
ly connected  as  these  two  ladies  with  a  great  poet,  I  have 
allowed  myself  a  larger  latitude  than  else  might  have  been 
justifiable  in  describing  them.  I  now  go  on  with  my  nar- 
rative :  — 

I  was  ushered  up  a  little  flight  of  stairs,  fourteen  in  all, 
to  a  little  dining-room,  or  whatever  the  reader  chooses  to 
call  it.  Wordsworth  himself  has  described  the  fire-place 
of  this  as  his 

*  Half-kitchen  and  half-parlor  fire,' 

It  was  not  fully  seven  feet  six  inches  high,  and,  in  other 
respects,  pretty  nearly  of  the  same  dimensions  as  the 
rustic  hall  below.  There  was,  however,  in  a  small 
recess,  a  library  of  perhaps  three  hundred  volumes, 
which  seemed  to  consecrate  the  room  as  the  poet's  study 
and  composing  room  ;  and  so  occasionally  it  was.  But 
far  oftener  he  both  studied,  as  I  found,  and  composed  on 
the  high  road.  I  had  not  been  two  minutes  at  the  fire- 
Bide,  when  in  came  Wordsworth,  returning  from  his 
friendly  attentions  to  the  travellers  below,  who,  it  seemed, 
bad  been  over-persuaded  by  hospitable  solicitations  to  stay 


280 


LITEKARY  KEMINISCENCES. 


for  this  night  in  Grasmere,  and  to  make  out  the  remaining 
thirteen  miles  of  their  road  to  Keswick  on  the  following 
day^  Wordsworth  entered.  And  '  what- like '  —  to  use  a 
Westmoreland,  as  well  as  a  Scottish  expression  — '  what- 
like '  was  Wordsworth  ?  A  reviewer  in  TaiVs  Maga- 
zine ^"^^  in  noticing  some  recent  collection  of  literary  por- 
traits, gives  it  as  his  opinion  that  dmrles  Lamb's  head  was 
the  finest  amongst  them.  This  remark  may  have  been 
justified  by  the  engraved  portraits  ;  but,  certainly,  the 
critic  would  have  cancelled  it  had  he  seen  the  original 
heads  —  at  least,  had  he  seen  them  in  youth  or  in  matu- 
rity ;  for  Charles  Lamb  bore  age  with  less  disadvantage 
to  the  intellectual  expression  of  his  appearance  than 
Wordsworth,  in  whom  a  sanguine,  or  rather  coarse  com- 
plexion, (or  rather  not  complexion,  properly  speaking,  so 
much  as  texture  of  flesh,)  has,  of  late  years,  usurped  upon 
the  original  bronze  4int  and  finer  skin  ;  and  this  change  of 
hue  and  change  in  the  quality  of  skin,  has  been  made 
fourfold  more  conspicuous,  and  more  unfavorable  in  its 
general  efi'ect,  by  the  harsh  contrast  of  grizzled  hair  which 
has  displaced  the  original  brown.  No  change  in  personal 
appearance  can  ever  have  been  so  unfortunate  ;  for,  gen- 
erally speaking,  whatever  other  disadvantages  old  age 
may  bring  along  with  it,  one  efi'ect,  at  least,  in  male  sub- 
jects, has  a  compensating  tendency  —  that  it  removes  any 
tone  of  vigor  too  harsh,  and  mitigates  the  expression  of 
power  too  unsubdued.  But,  in  Wordsworth,  the  efi'ect  of 
the  change  has  been  to  substitute  an  air  of  animal  vigor, 
or,  at  least,  hardiness,  as  if  derived  from  constant  exposure 
to  the  wind  and  weather,  for  the  fine,  sombre  complexion 
which  he  once  had,  resembling  that  of  a  Venetian  senatoi 
tr  a  Spanish  monk. 


•  Vol.  IV..  page  793,  (Deo.  1837.) 


WILLIAM  WOBDSWORTH. 


281 


Here,  however,  in  describing  the  personal  appearance 
of  Wordsworth,  I  go  back,  of  course,  to  the  point  of  time 
at  which  I  am  speaking.  To  begin  with  his  figure  :  — 
Wordsworth  was,  upon  the  whole,  not  a  well-made  man. 
His  legs  were  pointedly  condemned  by  all  the  female 
connoisseurs  in  legs  that  ever  I  heard  lecture  upon  that 
topic  ;  not  that  they  were  bad  in  any  way  which  would 
force  itself  upon  your  notice  —  there  was  no  absolute 
deformity  about  them  ;  and  undoubtedly  they  had  been 
serviceable  legs  beyond  the  average  standard  of  human 
requisition  ;  for  I  calculate,  upon  good  data,  that  with 
these  identical  legs  Wordsworth  must  have  traversed  a 
distance  of  175  to  180,000  English  miles  —  a  mode  of 
exertion  which,  to  him,  stood  in  the  stead  of  wine,  spirits, 
and  all  other  stimulants  whatsoever  to  the  animal  spirits  ; 
to  which  he  has  been  indebted  for  a  life  of  unclouded 
happiness,  and  we  for  much  of  what  is  most  excellent  in 
his  writings.  But,  useful  as  they  have  proved  themselves, 
the  Wordsworthian  legs  were  certainly  not  ornamental ; 
and  it  was  really  a  pity,  as  I  agreed  with  a  lady  in  think- 
ing, that  he  had  not  another  pair  for  evening  dress  parties 
—  when  no  boots  lend  their  friendly  aid  to  masque  our 
imperfections  from  the  eyes  of  female  rigorists  —  the 
elegantes  formarum  spectatrices,  A  sculptor  would  cer- 
tainly have  disapproved  of  their  contour.  But  the  worst 
part  of  Wordsworth's  person  was  the  bust :  there  was  a 
narrowness  and  a  droop  about  the  shoulders  which  became 
striking,  and  had  an  effect  of  meanness  when  brought 
into  close  juxtaposition  with  a  figure  of  a  most  statuesque 
order.    Once  on  a  summer  morning,  walking  in  the  vale 

of  Langdale  with  Wordsworth,  his  sister,  and  Mr.  J  , 

native  Westmoreland  clergyman,  I  remember  that  Miss 
Wordsworth  was  positively  mortified  by  the  peculiar 
Illustration  which  settled  upon  this  defective  conformation. 


282 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


Mr.  J  ,  a  fine  towering  figure,  six  feet  high,  massj 

and  columnar  in  his  proportions,  happened  to  be  walking, 
a  little  in  advance,  with  Wordsworth  ;  Miss  Wordsworth 
and  myself  being  in  the  rear  ;  and  from  the  nature  of  the 
conversation  which  then  prevailed  in  our  front  rank, 
something  or  other  about  money,  devises,  buying  and 
selling,  we  of  the  rear-guard  thought  it  requisite  to 
preserve  this  arrangement  for  a  space  of  three  miles  or 
more  ;  during  which  time,  at  intervals.  Miss  Wordsworth 
would  exclaim,  in  a  tone  of  vexation,  '  Is  it  possible  ?  — 
can  that  be  William  ?  How  very  mean  he  looks  ! '  and 
could  not  conceal  a  mortification  that  seemed  really 
painful,  until  I,  for  my  part,  could  not  forbear  laughing 
outright  at  the  serious  interest  which  she  carried  into  this 
trifle.  She  was,  however,  right  as  regarded  the  mere 
visual  judgment.  Wordsworth's  figure,  with  all  its  de- 
fects, was  brought  into  powerful  relief  by  one  which  had 
been  cast  in  a  more  square  and  massy  mould  ;  and  in 
such  a  case  it  impressed  a  spectator  with  a  sense  of 
absolute  meanness,  more  especially  when  viewed  from 
behind,  and  not  counteracted  by  his  countenance  ;  and 
yet  Wordsworth  was  of  a  good  height,  just  five  feet  ten, 
and  not  a  slender  man  ;  on  the  contrary,  by  the  side  of 
Southey  his  limbs  looked  thick,  almost  in  a  dispropor- 
tionate degree.  But  the  total  effect  of  Wordsworth's 
person  was  always  worst  in  a  state  of  motion ;  for, 
according  to  the  remark  I  have  heard  from  many  country 
people,  '  he  walked  like  a  cade '  —  a  cade  being  some 
sort  of  insect  which  advances  by  an  oblique  motion. 
This  was  not  always  perceptible,  and  in  part  depended 
(I  believe)  upon  the  position  of  his  arms  ;  when  eithei 
of  these  happened  (as  was  very  customary)  to  be  inserted 
nto  the  unbuttoned  waistcoat,  his  walk  had  a  wry  or 
twisted  appearance ;  and  not  appearance  only  —  for  J 


WILLIAM  WORDSWORTH. 


283 


have  knowu  it,  by  slow  degrees,  gradually  to  edge  ofl 
his  companion  from  the  middle  to  the  side  of  the  high- 
road."*  Meantime,  his  face  —  that  was  one  which  would 
have  made  amends  for  greater  defects  of  figure ;  it  was 
certainly  the  noblest  for  intellectual  effects  that,  in  actual 
life,  I  have  seen,  or  at  least  have  consciously  been  led  to 
notice.  Many  such,  or  even  finer,  I  have  seen  amongst 
the  portraits  of  Titian,  and,  in  a  later  period,  amongst 
those  of  Vandyke,  from  the  great  era  of  Charles  I.,  as  also 
from  the  court  of  Elizabeth  and  of  Charles  II.  ;  but  none 
which  has  so  much  impressed  me  in  my  own  time. 

Haydon,  the  eminent  painter,  in  his  great  picture  of 
Christ's  Entry  into  Jerusalem^  has  introduced  Words- 
worth in  the  character  of  a  disciple  attending  his  Divine 
Master.  This  fact  is  well  known,  and  as  the  picture 
itself  is  tolerably  well  known  to  the  public  eye,  there 
are  multitudes  now  living  who  will  have  seen  a  very 
impressive  likeness  of  Wordsworth  —  some  consciously, 
some  not  suspecting  it.  There  will,  however,  always  be 
many  who  have  not  seen  any  portrait  at  all  of  Words- 
worth ;  and  therefore  I  will  describe  its  general  outline 
and  effect.  It  was  a  face  of  the  long  order,  often  falsely 
classed  as  oval ;  but  a  greater  mistake  is  made  by  many 
people  in  supposing  the  long  face,  which  prevailed  so 
remarkably  in  the  Elizabethan  and  Carolinian  periods,  to 
have  become  extinct  in  our  days.  Miss  Ferrier,  in  one 
of  her  brilliant  novels,  ('  Marriage,'  I  think,)  makes  a 
Highland  girl  protest  that '  no  Englishman  ivith  his  round 
face '  shall  ever  wean  her  heart  from  her  own  country ; 
but  England  is  not  the  land  of  round  faces  —  and  those 

*  In  our  Westmoreland  highroads,  which  are  so  fortunate  as  to 
have  little  breadth  beyond  that  of  lanes,  there  is  no  side-path,  not 
«ven  on  approaching  towns  ;  consequently  everybody  walks  at  larga 
upon  the  carriage  track. 


284 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


have  obseived  little  indeed  wlio  think  so  ;  France  it  is  that 
grows  the  round  face,  and  in  so  large  a  majority  of  her 
provinces,  that  it  has  become  one  of  the  national  char- 
acteristics. And  the  remarkable  impression  which  an 
Englishman  receives  from  the  prevalence  of  the  eternal 
orb  of  the  human  countenance,  proves  of  itself,  without 
any  conscious  testimony,  how  the  fact  stands ;  in  the 
blind  sense  of  a  monotony,  in  this  respect  not  usual 
elsewhere,  lies  involved  an  argument  that  cannot  be 
gainsaid  Besides  receiving  this  evidence  from  positive 
experience,  even  upon  an  d  priori  argument,  how  is  it 
possible  that  the  long  face  so  prevalent  in  England,  by  all 
confession,  in  certain  splendid  eras  of  our  history,  should 
have  had  time,  in  some  five  or  six  generations,  to  grow 
extinct?  Again,  the  character  of  face  varies  essentially 
in  different  provinces.  Wales  has  no  connection  in  this 
respect  with  Devonshire,  nor  Kent  with  Yorkshire,  nor 
either  with  Westmoreland.  England,  it  is  true,  tends 
beyond  all  known  examples  to  a  general  amalgamation  of 
differences  by  means  of  its  unrivalled  freedom  of  inter- 
course. Yet  even  in  England,  law  and  necessity  have 
opposed  as  yet  such  and  so  many  obstacles  to  the  free  dif- 
fusion of  labor,  that  every  generation  occupies  by  at  least 
five  sixths  of  its  numbers  the  ground  of  its  ancestors. 

The  movable  part  of  a  population  is  chiefly  the  higher 
part;  and  it  is  the  lower  classes  that,  in  every  nation, 
compose  the  fundus,  in  which  lies  latent  the  national  face 
as  well  as  the  national  character.  Each  exists  here  in 
racy  purity  and  integrity,  not  disturbed  in  "^he  one  by 
alien  intermarriages,  nor  in  the  other  by  novelties  of 
opinion  or  other  casual  effects  derived  from  education 
and  reading.  Now,  look  into  this  fundus,  and  you  will 
find,  in  many  districts,  no  such  prevalence  of  the  round 
orbicular  ^ace  as  some  people  erroneously  suppose :  and 


WILLIAM  WORDSWORTH. 


285 


la  Westmoreland  especially,  the  ancient  long  face  of  the 
Elizabethan  period,  powerfully  resembling  in  all  its  linea- 
ments the  ancient  Roman  face,  and  often  (though  not  so 
uniformly)  the  face  of  northern  Italy  in  modern  times. 
The  face  of  Sir  Walter  Scott,  as  Irving,  the  pulpit  orator, 
once  remarked  to  me,  was  the  indigenous  face  of  the 
Border :  the  mouth,  which  was  bad,  and  the  entire  lower 
part  of  the  face,  are  seen  repeated  in  thousands  of  working 
men's ;  or,  as  Irving  chose  to  illustrate  his  position,  '  in 
thousands  of  Border  horse-jockeys.'  In  like  manner, 
Wordsworth's  face  was,  if  not  absolutely  the  indigenous 
face  of  the  Lake  district,  at  any  rate  a  variety  of  that  face, 
a  modification  of  that  original  type.  The  head  was  well 
filled  out ;  and  there,  to  begin  with,  was  a  great  advantage 
over  the  head  of  Charles  Lamb,  which  was  absolutely 
truncated  in  the  posterior  region  —  sawn  off,  as  it  were, 
by  no  timid  sawyer.  The  forehead  was  not  remarkably 
lofty  —  and,  by  the  way,  some  artists,  in  their  ardor  for 
realizing  their  phrenological  preconceptions,  not  suffering 
nature  to  surrender  quietly  and  by  slow  degrees,  her  own 
alphabet  of  signs,  and  characters,  and  hieroglyphical 
expressions,  but  forcing  her  language  prematurely  into 
a  conformity  with  their  own  crude  speculations,  have 
given  to  Sir  Walter  Scott  a  pile  of  forehead  which  is 
unpleasing  and  cataphysical,  in  fact,  a  caricature  of  any- 
thing that  is  ever  seen  in  nature,  and  would  (if  real)  be 
esteemed  a  deformity;  in  one  instance,  that  which  was 
introduced  in  some  annual  or  other,  the  forehead  makes 
about  two  thirds  of  the  entire  face.  Wordsworth's  fore- 
head is  also  liable  to  caricature  misreprespntations,  in 
these  days  of  phrenology :  but,  whatever  it  may  appear  to 
be  in  any  man's  fanciful  portrait,  the  real  living  forehead, 
as  I  have  been  in  the  habit  of  seeing  it  for  more  than  five- 
and-twenty  years,  is  not  remarkable  for  its  height ;  but  it 


286 


JjITEiiARY  EEMINISCENCEb. 


is  perhaps  remarkable  for  its  breadth  and  expansive 
development.  Neither  are  the  eyes  of  Wordsworth 
'  large/  as  is  erroneously  stated  somewhere  in  '  Peter's 
Letters  ; '  on  the  contrary,  they  are  (I  think)  rather  small ; 
but  that  does  not  interfere  with  their  effect,  which  at 
times  is  fine  and  suitable  to  his  intellectual  character.  At 
times,  I  say,  for  the  depth  and  subtlety  of  eyes  varies 
exceedingly  with  the  state  of  the  stomach ;  and,  if  young 
ladies  were  aware  of  the  magical  transformations  which 
can  be  wrought  in  the  depth  and  sweetness  of  the  eye  by 
a  few  weeks'  walking  exercise,  I  fancy  we  should  see  their 
habits  in  this  point  altered  greatly  for  the  better.  I  have 
seen  Wordsworth's  eyes  oftentimes  affected  powerfully  in 
this  respect ;  his  eyes  are  not,  under  any  circumstances, 
bright,  lustrous,  or  piercing ;  but,  after  a  long  day's  toil 
m  walking,  I  have  seen  them  assume  an  appearance  the 
most  solemn  and  spiritual  that  it  is  possible  for  the  human 
eye  to  wear.  The  light  which  resides  in  them  is  at  no 
time  a  superficial  light ;  but,  under  favorable  accidents,  it 
is  a  light  which  seems  to  come  from  depths  below  all 
depths ;  in  fact,  it  is  more  truly  entitled  to  be  held  '  The 
light  that  never  was  on  land  or  sea,'  a  light  radiating  from 
some  far  spiritual  world,  than  any  the  most  idealizing 
light  that  ever  yet  a  painter's  hand  created.  The  nose,  a 
little  arched,  and  large,  which,  by  the  way,  (according  to 
a  natural  phrenology,  existing  centuries  ago  amongst  some 
of  the  lowest  amongst  the  human  species,)  has  always 
been  accounted  an  unequivocal  expression  of  animal  appe- 
tites organically  strong.  And  that  was  in  fact  the  basis 
of  Wordsworth's  intellectual  power :  his  intellectual  pas- 
sions were  fervent  and  strong ;  because  they  rested  upon  a 
basis  of  animal  sensibility  superior  to  that  of  most  men, 
diffused  through  all  the  animal  passions  (or  appetites)  ; 
and  something  of  that  will  be  found  to  hold  of  all  poeti 


WILLIAM  WOEDSWOMH. 


287 


wYio  liave  been  great  by  original  force  and  power,  not 
(as  Virgil)  by  means  of  fine  management  and  exquisite 
artifice  of  composition  applied  to  their  conceptions.  The 
mouth,  and  the  region  of  the  mouth,  the  whole  circum- 
jacencies  of  the  mouth,  were  about  the  strongest  feature 
in  Wordsworth's  face  ;  there  was  nothing  specially  to  be 
noticed  that  I  know  of,  in  the  mere  outline  of  the  lips ; 
but  the  swell  and  protrusion  of  the  parts  above  and  around 
the  mouth,  are  both  noticeable  in  themselves,  and  also 
because  they  remind  me  of  a  very  interesting  fact  which  I 
discovered  about  three  years  after  this  my  first  visit  to 
Wordsworth. 

Being  a  great  collector  of  everything  relating  to  Milton, 
I  had  naturally  possessed  myself,  whilst  yet  very  young, 
of  Richardson  the  painter's  thick  octavo  volume  of  notes 
on  the  '  Paradise  Lost.'  It  happened,  however,  that  my 
copy,  in  consequence  of  that  mania  for  portrait  collecting 
which  has  stripped  so  many  English  classics  of  their 
engraved  portraits,  had  no  picture  of  Milton.  Subse- 
quently I  ascertained  that  it  ought  to  have  had  a  very 
good  likeness  of  the  great  poet ;  and  I  never  rested  until 
I  procured  a  copy  of  the  book,  which  had  not  sufi*ered  in 
this  respect  by  the  fatal  admiration  of  the  amateur.  The 
particular  copy  offered  to  me  was  one  which  had  been 
priced  unusually  high,  on  account  of  the  unusually  fine 
specimen  which  it  contained  of  the  engraved  portrait. 
This,  for  a  particular  reason,  I  was  exceedingly  anxious 
to  see ;  and  the  reason  was  —  that,  according  to  an 
anecdote  reported  by  Richardson  himself,  this  portrait,  of 
all  that  was  shown  to  her,  was  the  only  one  acknowledged, 
by  Milton's  last  surviving  daughter,  to  be  a  strong  likeness 
of  her  father.  And  her  involuntary  gestures  concurred 
with  her  deliberate  words  :  —  for,  on  seeing  all  the  rest, 
sto  WKS  silcDt  and  inanimate;  but  the  very  instant  she 


288 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


beheld  this  from  a  crayon  drawing  which  embellishes  the 
work  of  Richardson,  she  burst  out  into  a  rapture  of 
passionate  recognition  ;  exclaiming  — '  This  is  my  father ! 
this  is  my  dear  father  ! '  Naturally,  therefore,  after  such 
a  testimony,  so  much  stronger  than  any  other  person  in 
the  world  could  offer  to  the  authentic  value  of  this  portrait, 
I  was  eager  to  see  it. 

Judge  of  my  astonishment,  when,  in  this  portrait  of 
Milton,  I  saw  a  likeness  nearly  perfect  of  Wordsworth, 
better  by  much  than  any  which  I  have  since  seen,  of  those 
expressly  painted  for  himself.  The  likeness  is  tolerably 
preserved  in  that  by  Carruthers,  in  which  one  of  the  little 
Rydal  w^aterfalls,  dec,  composes  a  background  ;  yet  this 
is  much  inferior,  as  a  mere  portrait  of  Wordsworth,  to  the 
Richardson  head  of  Milton  ;  and  this,  I  believe,  is  the  last 
which  represents  Wordsworth  in  the  vigor  of  his  power. 
The  rest,  which  I  have  not  seen,  may  be  better  as  works 
of  art,  (for  anything  I  know  to  the  contrary,)  but  they 
must  labor  under  the  great  disadvantage  of  presenting  the 
features  when  '  defeatured '  in  the  degree  and  the  way  I 
have  described,  by  the  idiosyncrasies  of  old  age,  as  it 
affects  this  family  ;  for  it  is  noticed  of  the  Wordsworths, 
by  those  who  are  familiar  with  their  peculiarities,  that,  in 
their  very  blood  and  constitutional  differences,  lie  hidden 
causes,  able,  in  some  mysterious  way  — 

*  Those  shocks  of  passion  to  prepare 
That  kill  the  bloom  before  its  time. 
And  blanch,  without  the  owner's  crime, 
The  most  resplendent  hair.' 

Some  people,  it  is  notorious,  live  faster  than  others  ;  the 
oil  is  burned  out  sooner  in  one  constitution  than  another 
—  and  the  cause  of  this  may  be  various  ;  but,  in  the 
Wordsworths,  cne  part  of  the  cause  is,  no  doubt,  the 


WILLIAM  WORDSWORTH. 


289 


secret  fire  of  a  temperament  too  fervid  ;  the  self-consum- 
ing energies  of  the  brain,  that  gnaw  at  the  heart  and 
life-strings  for  ever.  In  that  account  which  '  The  Excur- 
sion,' presents  to  us  of  an  imaginary  Scotsman,  who,  to 
still  the  tumult  of  his  heart,  when  visiting  the  '  forces ' 
(i.  e.  cataracts)  of  a  mountainous  region,  obliges  himself 
to  study  the  laws  of  light  and  color,  as  they  affect  the 
rainbow  of  the  stormy  waters  ;  vainly  attempting  to  miti- 
gate the  fever  which  consumed  him  by  entangling  his 
mind  in  profound  speculations  ;  raising  a  cross-fire  of 
artillery  from  the  subtilizing  intellect,  under  the  vain 
conceit  that,  in  this  way,  he  could  silence  the  mighty 
battery  of  his  impassioned  brain  —  there  we  read  a 
picture  of  Wordsworth  and  his  own  youth.  In  Miss 
Wordsworth,  every  thoughtful  observer  might  read  the 
same  self-consuming  style  of  thought.  And  the  effect 
upon  each  was  so  powerful  for  the  promotion  of  a  prema- 
ture old  age,  and  of  a  premature  expression  of  old  age, 
that  strangers  invariably  supposed  them  fifteen  to  twenty 
years  older  than  they  were.  And  I  remember  Words- 
worth once  laughingly  reporting  to  me,  on  returning  from 
a  short  journey  in  1809,  a  little  personal  anecdote,  which 
sufiiciently  showed  what  was  the  spontaneous  impression 
upon  that  subject  of  casual  strangers,  whose  feelings  were 
not  confused  by  previous  knowledge  of  the  truth.  He 
was  travelling  by  a  stage-coach,  and  seated  outside, 
amongst  a  good  half  dozen  of  fellow-passengers.  One  of 
these,  an  elderly  man,  who  confessed  to  having  passed 
the  grand  climacterical  year  (9  multiplied  into  7)  of  63, 
though  he  did  not  say  precisely  by  how  many  years,  said 
to  Wordsworth,  upon  some  anticipations  which  they  had 
been  mutually  discussing  of  changes  likely  to  result  from 
enclosures,  vScc,  then  going  on  or  projecting — '  Ay,  ay, 
another  dozen  of  years  will  show  us  strange  sights  ;  but 


290 


LITEBART  REMINISCENCES. 


you  and  I  can  hardly  expect  to  see  them.'  '  How  so  ?  * 
said  W.  *  Why,  my  friend,  how  old  do  you  take  inc  tj 
be  ?  '  '  Oh,  I  beg  pardon,'  said  the  other  ;  •  I  meant  no 
offence  —  but  what  ? '  looking  at  W.  more  attentively  — 
'you'll  never  see  threescore,  I'm  of  opinion.'  And,  to 
show  that  he  was  not  singular  in  so  thinking,  he  appealed 
to  all  the  other  passengers  ;  and  the  motion  passed  nem. 
con.  that  Wordsworth  was  rather  over  than  under  sixty. 
Upon  this  he  told  them  the  literal  truth  —  that  he  had  not 
yet  accomplished  his  thirty-ninth  year.  '  God  bless  me !  * 
said  the  climacterical  man ;  so  then,  after  all,  you'll 
have  a  chance  to  see  your  childer  get  up  like,  and  get 
settled  !  God  bless  me,  to  think  of  that ! '  And  so  closed 
the  conversation,  leaving  to  W.  a  pointed  expression,  of 
his  own  premature  age,  as  revealing  itself  by  looks,  in 
this  unaffected  astonishment,  amongst  a  whole  party  of 
plain  men,  that  he  should  really  belong  to  a  generation  of 
the  forward-looking,  who  live  by  hope  ;  and  might  rea- 
sonably expect  to  see  a  child  of  seven  years  old  matured 
into  a  man. 

Returning  to  the  question  of  portraits,  I  would  observe, 
that  this  Richardson  engraving  of  Milton  has  the  advantage 
of  presenting,  not  only  by  far  the  best  likeness  of  Words- 
worth, but  of  Wordsworth  in  the  prime  of  his  powers  —  a 
point  so  essential  in  the  case  of  one  so  liable  to  premature 
decay.  It  may  be  supposed  that  I  took  an  early  opportu- 
nity of  carrying  the  book  down  to  Grasmere,  and  calling 
for  the  opinions  of  Wordsworth's  family  upon  this  most 
remarkable  caincidence.  Not  one  member  of  that  family 
but  was  as  much  impressed  as  myself  with  the  accuracy  of 
the  likeness.  All  the  peculiarities  even  were  retained  —  a 
drooping  appearance  of  the  eyelids,  that  remarkable  swell 
which  I  have  noticed  about  the  mouth,  the  way  in  which 
the  hair  lay  upon  the  forehead.    In  two  points  only  there 


WILLrAM  WORDSWORTH. 


291 


IV as  a  deviation  from  tlie  rigorous  truth  of  Wordsworth's 
features  —  the  face  was  a  little  too  short  and  too  broad 
and  the  eyes  were  too  large.  There  was  also  a  wreath  of 
laurel  about  the  head,  which  (as  Wordsworth  remarked) 
disturbed  the  natural  expression  of  the  whole  picture  ; 
else,  and  with  these  few  allowances,  he  also  admitted  that 
the  resemblance  was,  for  that  period  of  his  life,  (but  let 
not  that  restriction  be  forgotten,)  perfect,  or  as  nearly  so 
as  art  could  accomplish. 

I  have  gone  into  so  large  and  circumstantial  a  review 
of  my  recollections  in  a  matter  that  would  have  been 
trifling  and  tedious  in  excess,  had  their  recollection  related 
to  a  less  important  man  ;  but,  w^ith  a  certain  knowledge 
that  the  least  of  them  will  possess  a  lasting  and  a  growing 
interest  in  connection  with  William  Wordsworth  —  a  man 
who  is  not  simply  destined  to  be  had  in  everlasting  re- 
membrance by  every  generation  of  men,  but  (which  is  a 
modification  of  the  kind  worth  any  multiplication  of  the 
degree)  to  be  had  in  that  sort  of  remembrance  which  has 
for  its  shrine  the  heart  of  man  —  that  world  of  fear  and 
grief,  of  love  and  trembling  hope,  which  constitutes  the 
essential  man  ;  in  that  sort  of  remembrance,  and  not  in 
such  a  remembrance  as  we  grant  to  the  ideas  of  a  great 
philosopher,  a  great  mathematician,  or  a  great  reformer. 
How  different,  how  peculiar,  is  the  interest  which  attends 
the  great  poets  who  have  made  themselves  necessary  to 
the  human  heart ;  who  have  first  brought  into  conscious- 
.tiess,  and  next  have  <dothed  in  words,  those  grand  catholic 
feelings  that  belong  to  the  grand  catholic  situations  of  life, 
through  all  its  stages ;  who  have  clothed  them  in  such  words 
that  human  wit  despairs  of  bettering  them !  How  remote 
is  that  burning  interest  which  settles  upon  men's  living 
memories  in  our  daily  thoughts,  from  that  which  follows, 
m  a  disjointed  and  limping  way,  the  mere  nominal  memo- 


292 


LITERAKY  REMINISCENCES. 


ries  of  tliose  who  have  given  a  direction  and  mo  i'ement  to 
the  currents  of  human  thought,  and  who,  hy  some  leading 
impulse,  have  even  quickened  into  life  speculations  appoint- 
ed to  terminate  in  positive  revolutions  of  human  power  over 
physical  agents  !  Mighty  were  the  powers,  solemn  and 
serene  is  the  memory,  of  Archimedes  :  and  Appolonius 
shines  like  '  the  starry  Galileo,'  in  the  firmament  of  hu- 
man genius  ;  yet  how  frosty  is  the  feeling  associated  with 
these  names  by  comparison  with  that  which,  upon  every 
sunny  brae,  by  the  side  of  every  ancient  forest,  even  in 
the  farthest  depths  of  Canada,'*  many  a  young  innocent  girl, 
perhaps  at  this  very  moment  —  looking  now  with  fear  to 
the  dark  recesses  of  the  infinite  forest,  and  now  with  love 
to  the  pages  of  the  infinite  poet,  until  the  fear  is  absorbed 
and  forgotten  in  the  love  —  cherishes  in  her  heart  for  the 
name  and  person  of  Shakspeare  !  The  one  is  abstraction, 
and  a  shadow  recurring  only  by  distinct  efibrts  of  recol- 
lection, and  even  thus  to  none  but  the  enlightened  and  the 
learned  ;  the  other  is  a  household  image,  rising  amongst 
household  remembrances,  never  separated  from  the  spirit 
of  delight,  and  hallowed  by  a  human  love  !  Such  a  place 
in  the  affections  of  the  young  and  the  ingenuous,  no  less 
than  of  the  old  and  philosophic,  who  happen  to  have  any 
depth  of  feeling,  will  Wordsworth  occupy  in  every  clime 
and  in  every  land  ;  for  the  language  in  which  he  writes, 
thanks  be  to  Providence,  which  has  beneficently  opened 
the  widest  channels  for  the  purest  and  most  elevating 
literature,  is  now  ineradicably  planted  in  all  quarters  of 
the  earth  ;  the  echoes  under  every  latitude  of  every  longi- 
tude now  reverberate  English  words  ;  and  all  things  seem 
iending  to  this  result  —  that  the  English  and  the  Spanish 
languages  will  finally  share  the  earth  between  them. 
Wordsworth  is  peculiarly  the  poet  for  the  solitary  and  the 
meditative  ;  and,  throughout  the  countless  myriads  of  future 


WILLIAM  WOEDSWORTH. 


293 


America  and  future  Australia,  no  less  than  Polynesia  and 
Southern  Africa,  theie  will  be  situations  without  end,  fitted 
by  their  loneliness  to  favor  his  influence  for  centuries  to 
come,  by  the  end  of  which  period  it  may  be  anticipated 
that  education  (of  a  more  enlightened  quality  and  more 
systematic  than  yet  prevails)  may  have  wrought  such 
changes  on  the  human  species,  as  will  uphold  the  growth 
of  all  philosophy,  and,  therefore,  of  all  poetry  which  has 
its  foundations  laid  in  the  heart  of  man. 

Commensurate  with  the  interest  in  the  poetry  will  be  a 
secondary  interest  in  the  poet  —  in  his  personal  appear- 
ance, and  his  habits  of  life,  so  far  as  they  can  he  supposed 
at  all  dependent  upon  his  intellectual  characteristics  ;  for, 
with  respect  to  differences  that  are  purely  casual,  and 
which  illustrate  no  principle  of  higher  origin  than  acci- 
dents of  education  or  chance  position,  it  :s  a  gossiping 
taste  only,  that  could  seek  for  such  information,  and  a  gos- 
siping taste  that  would  choose  to  consult  it.  Meantime,  it 
is  under  no  such  gossiping  taste  that  volumes  have  been 
written  upon  the  mere  portraits  and  upon  the  possible 
portraits  of  Shakspeare ;  and  how  invaluable  should  we 
all  feel  any  record  to  be,  which  should  raise  the  curtain 
upon  Shakspeare' s  daily  life  —  his  habits,  personal  and 
<iocial,  his  intellectual  tastes,  and  his  opinions  on  con- 
.  emporary  men,  books,  events,  or  national  prospects !  I 
cannot,  therefore,  think  it  necessary  to  apologize  for  the 
most  circumstantial  notices,  past  or  to  come,  of  Words- 
worth's person  and  habits  of  life.  But  one  thing  it  is 
highly  necessary  that  I  should  explain,  and  the  more  so 
because  a  grand  confession  which  I  shall  make  at  this 
point  as  in  some  measure  necessary  to  protect  myself 
from  the  appearance  of  a  needless  mystery  and  reserve, 
would,  if  unaccompanied  by  such  an  explanation,  expose 
me  to  the  suspicion  of  having,  at  times,  yielded  to  % 


294 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


pri>  ate  prejudice,  so  far  as  to  color  my  account  of  Words* 
worth  with  a  spirit  of  pique  or  illiberality.  I  shall 
acknowledge,  then,  on  my  own  part  —  and  I  feel  that  I 
might  even  make  the  same  acknowledgment  on  the  part 
of  Professor  Wilson  —  (though  I  have  no  authority  for 
doing  so)  —  that  to  neither  of  us,  though,  at  all  periods 
of  our  lives,  treating  him  with  the  deep  respect  which  is 
his  due,  and,  in  our  earlier  years,  with  a  more  than  filial 
devotion  —  nay,  with  a  blind  loyalty  of  homage,  which 
had  in  it,  at  that  time,  something  of  the  spirit  of  martyr- 
dom, which,  for  his  sake,  courted  even  reproach  and  con- 
tumely ;  yet  to  neither  of  us  has  Wordsworth  made  those 
returns  of  friendship  and  kindness  which  most  firmly  I 
maintain  that  we  were  entitled  to  have  challenged.  More 
by  far  in  sorrow  than  in  anger  —  sorrow  that  points  to 
recollections  too  deep  and  too  personal  for  a  transient 
notice  —  I  acknowledge  myself  to  have  been  long  alien- 
ated from  Wordsworth ;  sometimes  even  I  feel  a  rising 
emotion  of  hostility  —  nay,  something,  I  fear,  too  nearly 
akin  to  vindictive  hatred.  Strange  revolution  of  the 
human  heart !  strange  example  of  the  changes  in  human 
feeling  that  may  be  wrought  by  time  and  chance !  to  find 
myself  carried  by  the  great  tide  of  affairs,  and  by  error, 
more  or  less,  on  one  side  or  the  other,  either  on  Words- 
worth's in  doing  too  little,  or  on  mine  in  expecting  too 
much  —  carried  so  far  away  from  that  early  position 
K^hich,  for  so  long  a  course  of  years,  I  held  in  respect  to 
him  —  that  now,  for  that  fountain  of  love  towards  Mr 
Wordsworth  and  all  his  household — fountain  profound  — 
fountain  inexhaustible  — 

*  Whose  only  business  was  to  flow  — 
And  flow  it  did,  not  taking  heed 
Of  its  own  bounty  or  their  need  '  — 

noWy  I  find  myself  standing  aloof,  gloomily  granting  (boi 


WILLIAM  vVlRDSWORTH. 


295 


lause  I  cannot  refuse)  my  intellectual  homage,  but  no 
longer  rendering  my  tribute  as  a  willing  service  of  the 
heart,  or  rejoicing  in  the  prosperity  of  my  idol  !  Could  I 
have  believed,  twenty-five  years  ago,  had  a  voice  from 
Heaven  revealed  it,  that,  even  then,  with  a  view  to  what 
time  should  bring  about,  I  might  adopt  the  spirit  of  the 
old  verses,  and,  apostrophizing  Wordsworth,  might  say  — - 
Great  Poet !  when  that  day,  so  fervently  desired,  shall 
come,  that  men  shall  undo  their  wrongs,  and  when  every 
tongue  shall  chant  thy  praises,  and  every  heart 

*  Devote  a  wreath  to  thee  — 
That  day  (for  come  it  will)  that  day 
Shall  I  lament  to  see.' 

But  no ;  not  so.  Lament  I  never  did ;  nor  suffered 
even  '  the  hectic  of  a  moment '  to  sully  or  to  trouble  that 
purity  of  perfect  pleasure  with  which  I  welcomed  this 
great  revolution  in  the  public  feeling.  Let  me  render 
justice  to  Professor  Wilson,  as  well  as  to  myself:  not  for 
a  moment,  not  by  a  solitary  movement  of  reluctance  or 
demur,  did  either  of  us  hang  back  in  giving  that  public 
acclamation  which  we,  by  so  many  years,  had  antici- 
pated ;  yes,  we  singly  —  we  with  no  sympathy  to  support 
us  from  any  quarter.  The  public  press  remains,  with  its 
mexorable  records,  to  vouch  for  us,  that  we  paid  an 
oriental  homage  —  homage  as  to  one  who  could  have 
pleaded  antique  privilege,  and  the  consecration  of  centu- 
ries, at  a  time  when  the  finger  of  scorn  was  pointed  at 
Mr.  Wordsworth  from  every  journal  in  the  land  ;  and 
that  we  persisted  in  this  homage  at  a  period  long  enough 
removed  to  have  revolutionized  the  public  mind,  and  also 
'ong  enough  to  have  undermined  the  personal  relations 
between  us  of  confilential  friendship.  Did  it  ask  no 
30'kirage  to  come  forward,  in  the  first  character,  as  solitary 


296 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


friends,  liolding  up  our  protesting  hands  amidst  a  wilder- 
ness of  chattering  buffoons  ?  Did  it  ask  no  magnanimity 
to  stand  firmly  to  the  post  we  had  assumed,  not  passively 
acquiescing  in  the  new  state  of  public  opinion,  but  exult- 
ing in  it  and  aiding  it,  long  after  we  had  found  reason  to 
think  ourselves  injuriously  treated?  Times  are  changed; 
it  needs  no  courage,  in  the  year  of  our  Lord  1839,  to 
discover  and  proclaim  a  great  poet  in  William  Words- 
worth;  it  needed  none  in  the  year  1815,  to  discover  a 
frail  power  in  the  French  empire,  or  an  idol  of  clay  and 
brass  in  the  French  Emperor.  But,  to  make  the  first  dis- 
covery in  the  years  1801,  1802,  the  other  in  1808,  those 
things  were  worthy  of  honor  ;  and  the  first  was  worthy 
of  gratitude  from  all  the  parties  interested  in  the  event. 
Let  me  not,  however,  be  misunderstood  —  Mr.  Words- 
worth is  a  man  of  unimpeached,  unimpeachable  integrity : 
he  neither  has  done,  nor  could  have  done,  consciously, 
any  act  in  violation  of  his  conscience.  On  the  contrary, 
I  am  satisfied.  Professor  Wilson  is  satisfied,  that  injuries 
of  a  kind  to  involve  an  admitted  violation  of  principle, 
cannot  have  occurred  in  Mr.  Wordsworth's  intercourse 
with  any  man.  But  there  are  cases  of  wrong  for  which 
the  conscience  is  not  the  competent  tribunal.  Sensibility 
to  the  just  claims  of  another,  power  to  appreciate  these 
claims,  power  also  to  perceive  the  true  mode  of  conveying 
and  expressing  the  appreciation  —  in  a  case,  suppose, 
vhere  the  claims  to  consideration  are  at  once  real,  and 
even  tangible,  as  to  their  ground,  yet  subtle  and  aerial 
as  to  the  shape  they  have  assumed  —  claims,  for  instance, 
founded  on  a  personal  devotion  to  the  interests  of  the 
ither  party,  when  the  rest  of  the  world  slighted  them  — 
this  mode  of  appreciating  skill  may  be  utterly  wanting, 
or  may  be  crossed  and  thwarted  by  many  a  conflicting 
bias,  where  the  conscience  is  quite  incapable  of  going 


WILLIAM  WORDSWORTH. 


291 


Esxray.  I  imagine  a  case  such,  as  this  which  follows  :  — 
The  case  of  a  man  who,  for  many  years,  has  connected 
himself  closely  with  the  domestic  griefs  and  joys  of 
another,  over  and  above  his  primary  service  of  giving  to 
him  the  strength  and  the  encouragement  of  a  profound 
literary  sympathy,  at  a  time  of  universal  scowling  from 
the  world ;  suppose  this  man  to  fall  into  a  situation  in 
which,  from  want  of  natural  connections  and  from  his 
state  of  insulation  in  life,  it  might  be  most  important  to 
his  feelings  that  some  support  should  be  lent  to  him  by  a 
family  having  a  known  place  and  acceptation,  and  what 
may  be  called  a  root  in  the  country,  by  means  of  connec- 
tions, descent,  and  long  settlement.  To  look  for  this, 
might  be  a  most  humble  demand  on  the  part  of  one  who 
had  testified  his  devotion  in  the  way  supposed.  To  miss 
it  might  — —  but  enough.  I  murmur  not ;  complaint  is 
weak  at  all  times ;  and  the  hour  is  passed  irrevocably, 
and  by  many  a  year,  in  which  an  act  of  friendship  so 
natural,  and  costing  so  little,  (in  both  senses  so  priceless,) 
could  have  been  availing.  The  ear  is  deaf  that  should 
have  been  solaced  by  the  sound  of  welcome.  Call,  but 
you  will  not  be  heard ;  shout  aloud,  but  your  '  ave  ! '  and 
'  all  hail ! '  will  now  tell  only  as  an  echo  of  departed  days, 
proclaiming  the  hollowness  of  human  hopes.  I,  for  my 
^art,  have  long  learned  the  lesson  of  suffering  in  silence ; 
tnd  also  I  have  learned  to  know  that,  wheresoever  female 
prejudices  are  concerned,  there  it  will  be  a  trial  more  than 
Herculean,  of  a  man's  wisdom,  if  he  can  walk  with  an 
even  step,  and  swerve  neither  to  the  right  nor  the  left. 

I  shall  now  proceed  to  sketch  the  daily  life  and  habits 
of  those  who  are  familiarly  known  to  the  public  as  the 
Lake  Poets ;  but,  first  of  all,  as  a  proper  introduction  to 
this  sketch,  I  shall  trace,  in  a  brief  outline,  the  chief 


298 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


mcidents  in  the  life  of  William  Wordsworth,  which  are 
interesting,  not  only  in  virtue  of  their  illustrious  subject, 
but  also  as  exhibiting  a  most  remarkable  (almost  a  provi- 
vidential)  arrangement  of  circumstances,  all  tending  to 
one  result  —  that  of  insulating  from  worldly  cares,  and 
carrying  onward  from  childhood  to  the  grave,  in  a  state 
of  serene  happiness,  one  who  was  unfitted  for  daily  toil, 
and,  at  all  events,  who  could  not,  under  such  demands 
upon  his  time  and  anxieties,  have  prosecuted  those  genial 
labors  in  which  all  mankind  have  an  interest. 


W7LLIAM  WORDSWORTH. 


299 


CHAPTER  XI. 

WILLIAM  WORDSWORTH. 

William  Wordsworth  was  born  at  Cockermouth,  a 
small  town  of  Cumberland,  seated  on  the  river  Cocker. 
His  father  was  a  lawyer,  and  acted  as  an  agent  for  that 
Lord  Lonsdale,  who  is  not  unfrequently  described  by 
those  who  still  remember  him,  as  'the bad  Lord  Lonsdale.' 
In  what  was  he  bad  ?  Chiefly,  I  believe,  in  this  —  that, 
being  a  man  of  great  local  power,  founded  on  his  rank,  on 
his  official  station  of  Lord  Lieutenant  over  two  counties, 
and  on  a  very  large  estate,  he  used  his  power  in  a  most 
oppressive  way.  I  have  heard  it  said  that  he  was  mad  ;  and, 
at  any  rate,  he  was  inordinately  capricious  —  capricious 
even  to  eccentricity.  But  perhaps  his  madness  was  nothing 
more  than  the  intemperance  of  a  haughty  and  a  headstrong 
will,  encouraged  by  the  consciousness  of  power,  and  tempt- 
ed to  abuses  of  it  by  the  abject  servility  which  poverty 
and  dependence  presented  in  one  direction,  embittering 
the  contrast  of  that  defiance  which  inevitably  faced  him  in 
another  throughout  a  land  of  freedom,  and  amongst  spirits 
as  haughty  as  his  own.  He  was  a  true  feudal  chieftain  ; 
*nd,  in  the  very  approaches  to  his  mansion,  in  the  style 
of  his  equipage,  or  whatever  else  was  likely  to  meet  the 
public  eye,  he  delighted  to  express  his  disdain  of  modern 
refinements,  and  the  haughty  carelessness  of  his  magnifi- 
cence.   The  coach  in  which  he  used  to  visit  Penrith,  the 


300 


LITEBABY  REMINISCENCES. 


nearest  town  to  his  principal  house  of  Lowther,  was  old 
and  neglected  :  his  horses  fine,  but  untrimmed  ;  and  such 
was  the  in  pression  diffused  about  him  by  his  gloomy 
temper  and  his  habits  of  oppression,  that  the  streets  were 
silent  as  he  traversed  them,  and  an  awe  sate  upon  many 
faces,  (so  at  least,  I  have  heard  a  Penrith  contemporary 
of  the  old  despot  declare,)  pretty  much  like  that  which 
may  be  supposed  to  attend  the  entry  into  a  guilty  town,  of 
some  royal  commission  for  trying  state  criminals.  In  his 
park,  you  saw  some  of  the  most  magnificent  timber  in  the 
kingdom  —  trees  that  were  coeval  with  the  feuds  of  York 
and  Lancaster,  yews  that  perhaps  had  furnished  bows  to 
Coeur  de  Lion,  and  oaks  that  might  have  built  a  navy. 
All  was  savage  grandeur  about  these  native  forests  :  their 
sweeping  lawns  and  glades  had  been  unapproached,  for 
centuries  it  might  be,  by  the  hand  of  art ;  and  amongst 
them  roamed  —  not  the  timid  fallow  deer  —  but  thundering 
droves  of  wild  horses. 

Lord  Lonsdale,  according  to  an  old  English  writer,  (in 
describing,  I  think,  the  Earl  of  Arundel,)  '  went  sometimes 
to  London,  because  there  only  he  found  a  greater  man 
than  himself;  but  not  often,  because  at  home  he  was 
allowed  to  forget  that  there  was  such  a  man.'  Even  in 
London,  however,  his  haughty  injustice  found  occasions 
for  making  itself  known.  On  a  court  day,  (I  revive  an 
anecdote  once  familiarly  known,)  St.  James's  Street  was 
lined  by  cavalry,  and  the  orders  were  peremptory,  that  no 
carriages  should  be  allowed  to  pass,  except  those  which 
were  carrying  parties  to  court.  Whether  it  were  by  acci- 
dent or  no.  Lord  Lonsdale's  carriage  advanced,  and  the 
coachman,  in  obedience  to  orders  shouted  out  from  the 
window,  was  turning  down  the  forbidden  route,  when  a 
\rooper  rode  up  to  the  horses'  heads,  and  stopped  them^ 
the  thundering  menaces  of  Lord  Lonsdale  perplexed  tiie 


WILLIAM  WORDSWORTH. 


301 


soldier,  who  did  not  know  but  lie  might  be  bringing  him- 
self into  a  scrape  by  persisting  in  his  opposition  ;  but  the 
officer  on  duty,  observing  the  scene,  rode  up,  and,  in  a 
determined  tone,  enforced  the  order,  causing  two  of  his 
men  to  turn  the  horses'  heads  round  into  Piccadilly.  Lord 
Lonsdale  threw  his  card  to  the  officer  —  and  a  duel  fol- 
lowed ;  in  which,  however,  the  outrageous  injustice  of  his 
Lordship  met  with  a  pointed  rebuke  ;  for  the  first  person 
whom  he  summoned  to  his  aid,  in  the  quality  of  second, 
though  a  friend,  and  believe)  a  relative  of  his  own, 
declined  to  sanction,  by  any  interference,  so  scandalous  a 
quarrel  with  an  officer  for  simply  executing  an  official 
duty.  In  this  dilemma  —  for  probably  he  was  aware  that 
few  military  men  would  fail  to  take  the  same  disapproving 
view  of  the  affair  —  he  applied  to  the  present  Earl  of 
Lonsdale,  then  Sir  William  Lowther.  Either  there  must 
have  been  some  needless  discourtesy  in  the  officer's  mode 
of  fulfilling  his  duty,  or  else  Sir  William  thought  the 
necessity  of  the  case,  however  wantonly  provoked,  a  suffi- 
cient justification  for  a  relative  giving  his  assistance,  even 
under  circumstances  of  such  egregious  injustice.  At  any 
rate,  it  is  due  to  Sir  William,  in  mere  candor,  to  suppose 
that  he  did  nothing  in  this  instance  but  what  his  con- 
science approved  ;  seeing,  that  in  all  others  his  conduct 
has  been  such  as  to  win  him  the  -universal  respect  of  the 
two  counties  in  which  he  is  best  known.  He  it  was  that 
acted  as  second  ;  and,  by  a  will  which  is  said  to  have 
been  dated  the  same  day,  he  became  eventually  possessed 
of  a  large  property,  which  did  not  necessarily  accompany 
che  title. 

Another  anecdote  is  told  of  the  same  Lord  Lonsdale, 
«rhich  expresses,  in  a  more  eccentric  w^ay,  and  a  waj 

♦  Who  must  now  (1854)  be  classed  as  the  late  Earl. 


302 


XITERARY  SEMINISCENCES. 


that  to  many  people  will  be  affecting  —  to  some  shock- 
ing—  the  moody  energy  of  his  passions.  He  loved,  with 
passionate  fervor,  a  fine  youn^  woman,  of  humble  parent- 
age, in  a  Cumberland  farm-house.  Her  he  had  persuaded 
to  leave  her  father  and  put  herself  under  his  protection. 
Whilst  yet  young  and  beautiful,  she  died  :  Lord  Lons- 
dale's sorrow  was  profound ;  he  could  not  bear  the  thought 
of  a  final  parting  from  that  face  which  had  become  so 
familiar  to  his  heart ;  he  caused  her  to  be  embalmed ;  a 
glass  was  placed  over  her  features  ;  and,  at  intervals, 
when  his  thoughts  reverted  to  her  memory,  he  found  a 
consolation  (or  perhaps  a  luxurious  irritation)  of  h?s  sor- 
row, in  visiting  this  sad  memorial  of  his  former  happiness. 
This  story,  which  I  have  often  heard  repeated  by  the 
country  people  of  Cumberland,  strengthened  the  general 
feeling  of  this  eccentric  nobleman's  self-willed  character, 
though  in  this  instance  complicate*^  with  a  trait  of  char- 
acter, that  argued  nobler  capacities.  By  what  rules  he 
guided  himself  in  dealing  with  the  various  lawyers,  agents, 
or  stewards,  whom  his  extensive  estates  brought  into  a 
dependency  upon  his  justice  or  his  moderation  —  whether 
in  fact  he  had  no  rule,  but  left  all  to  accident  or  caprice  — 
I  have  never  learned.  Generally,  I  have  heard  it  said, 
that  in  some  years  of  his  life  he  resisted  the  payment  of 
all  bills  indiscriminately,  which  he  had  any  colorable  plea 
for  supposing  to  contain  overcharges ;  some  fared  ill 
because  they  were  neighbors ;  and  his  Lordship  could 
say,  that  '  he  knew  them  to  be  knaves  ;  '  others  fared 
worse,  because  they  were  so  remote  that  '  how  could  his 
Lordship  know  what  they  were  ?  '  Of  this  number,  and 
possibly  for  this  reason  left  unpaid,  was  Wordsworth's 
father.  He  died  whilst  his  four  sons  and  one  daughter 
were  yet  helpless  children,  leaving  to  them  respectable 
(brtunes  ;  but  which,  as  y^t,  were  unrealized  and  tolerably 


WIIiLIAM  WOUDSWOHTH. 


303 


hypothetic,  as  they  happened  to  depend  upon  so  shadowy 
a  basis  as  the  justice  of  Lord  Lonsdale.  The  executors 
of  the  will,  and  trustees  of  the  children's  interests,  in  one 
point  acted  wisely  :  foreseeing  the  result  of  a  legal  con- 
test with  so  potent  a  defendant  as  this  leviathan  of  two 
counties,  and  that,  under  any  nominal  award,  the  whole 
estate  of  the  orphans  must  be  swallowed  up  in  the  costs 
of  a  suit  that  would  be  carried  into  Chancery,  and  finally 
before  the  Lords,  they  prudently  withdrew  from  all  active 
measures  of  opposition,  confiding  the  event  to  Lord  Lons- 
dale's returning  sense  of  justice.  Unfortunately  for  that 
nobleman's  reputation,  and  also,  as  was  thought,  for  the 
children's  prosperity,  before  this  somewhat  rusty  quality 
of  justice  could  have  time  to  operate,  his  Lordship  died. 

However,  for  once  the  world  was  wrong  in  its  antici- 
pations for  the  children  :  the  successor  to  Lord  Lonsdale's 
titles  and  Cumberland  estates  was  made  aware  of  the 
entire  case,  in  all  its  circumstances  ;  and  he  very  honora- 
bly gave  directions  for  full  restitution  being  made.  This 
was  done  ;  and  in  one  respect  the  result  was  more  fortu- 
nate for  the  children  than  if  they  had  been  trained  from 
youth  to  rely  upon  their  expectations  :  for  by  the  time  this 
repayment  was  made,  three  out  of  the  five  children  were 
already  settled  in  life,  with  the  very  amplest  prospects 
opening  before  them  —  so  ample  as  to  make  their  private 
patrimonial  fortunes  of  inconsiderable  importance  in  their 
eyes  :  and  very  probably  the  withholding  of  their  inheri- 
tance it  was,  however  unjust,  and  however  little  contem- 
plated as  an  occasion  of  any  such  efiect,  that  urged  these 
three  persons  to  the  exertions  requisite  for  their  present 
success.  Two  only  of  the  children  remained  to  whom 
the  restoration  of  theii  patrimony  was  a  matter  of  grave 
mportance  ;  but  it  was  precisely  those  two  whom  no 
circumstances  could   have  made  independent  of  their 


304 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


hereditary  means  by  personal  exertions  —  viz.  William 
Wordsworth,  the  poet,  and  Dorothy,  the  sole  daughter  of 
the  house.  The  three  others  were  —  Richard,  the  eldest ; 
he  had  become  a  thriving  solicitor  at  one  of  the  inns  of 
court  in  London ;  and,  if  he  died  only  moderately  rich, 
and  much  below  the  expectations  of  his  acquaintance,  in 
the  final  result  of  his  laborious  life,  it  was  because  he  was 
moderate  in  his  desires ;  and,  in  his  later  years,  reverting 
to  the  pastoral  region  of  his  infancy  and  boyhood,  chose 
rather  to  sit  down  by  a  hearth  of  his  own  amongst  the 
Cumberland  mountains,  and  wisely  to  woo  the  deities  of 
domestic  pleasures  and  health,  than  to  follow  the  chase 
after  wealth  in  the  feverish  crowds  of  the  capital.  The 
third  son,  I  believe  was  Christopher,  (Dr.  Wordsworth,) 
who,  at  an  early  age,  became  a  man  of  importance  in  the 
English  church,  being  made  one  of  the  chaplains  and 
librarians  of  the  Archbishop  of  Canterbury,  (Dr.  Manners 
Sutton,  father  of  the  late  Speaker.)  He  has  since  risen 
to  the  important  and  dignified  station  —  once  held  Dy 
Barrow,  and  afterwards  by  Bentley  —  of  Master  of  Trin- 
ity in  Cambridge.  Trinity  in  Oxford  is  not  a  first-rate 
college :  but  Trinity,  Cambridge,  answers  in  rank  and 
authority  to  Christ  Church  in  Oxford ;  and  to  be  the  head 
of  that  college  is  rightly  considered  on  a  level  with  a 
bishopric. 

Dr.  Wordsworth  has  distinguished  himself  as  an  author 
by  several  very  useful  republications,  (especially  the 
*  Ecclesiastical  Biography,')  which  he  has  enriched  with 
valuable  notes.  And  in  his  own  person,  besides  other 
works  more  exclusively  learned,  he  is  the  author  of  one 
very  interesting  work  of  historical  research  upon  the  long 
agitated  question  of  '  Who  wrote  the  Eicon  Basilike  ? '  a 
question  still  unsettled,  but  much  nearer  to  a  settlement  in 
consequence  of  the  strong  presumptions  which  Dr.  Words. 


WILLIAM  WORDSWORTH. 


305 


worth  has  adduced  on  behalf  of  the  King's  claim. The 
fourth  and  youngest  son,  John,  was  in  the  service  of  the 
East  India  Company,  and  perished  most  unhappily  on  the 
voyage  which  he  had  meant  to  be  his  last,  off  the  coast 
of  Dorsetshire,  in  the  Company's  ship  Abergavenny.  A 
calumny  was  current  at  the  time,  that  Captain  Wordsworth 
was  in  a  state  of  intoxication  at  the  time  of  the  calamity. 
But  the  printed  report  of  the  affair,  revised  by  survivors, 
entirely  disproves  the  calumny ;  which,  besides,  was  in 
itself  incredible  to  all  who  were  acquainted  with  Captain 

*  'Eicon  JBasilike ; '  —  By  the  way,  in  the  lamented  Eliot  War- 
burton's  *  Prince  Rupert,'  this  book,  by  a  very  excusable  mistake,  is 
always  cited  as  the  *  Eicon  Basilico/i : '  he  was  thinking  of  the  '  Doron 
Basilicon  '  written  by  Charles's  father  :  each  of  the  nouns,  Eicon  and 
Dor  on,  having  the  same  terminal  syllable  —  on  —  it  was  most 
excusable  to  forget  that  the  first  belonged  to  an  imparisyllabic 
declension,  so  as  to  be  feminine,  the  second  not  so  ;  which  made  it 
neuter.  With  respect  to  the  great  standing  question  as  to  the  author- 
ship of  the  work,  I  have  myself  always  held,  that  the  natural  freedom 
of  judgment  in  this  case  has  been  intercepted  by  one  strong  prepos- 
session (entirely  false)  from  the  very  beginning.  The  minds  of  all 
people  have  been  pre-occupied  with  the  notion,  that  Dr.  Gauden,  the 
reputed  author,  obtained  his  bishopric  confessedly  on  the  credit  of 
that  service.  Lord  Clarendon,  it  is  said,  who  hated  the  doctor, 
nevertheless  gave  him  a  bishopric,  on  the  sole  ground  of  his  having 
written  the  *  Eicon.'  The  inference  therefore  is  —  that  the  Prime 
Minister,  who  gave  so  reluctantly,  must  have  given  under  an  irresist- 
ible weight  of  proof  that  the  doctor  really  had  done  the  work  for 
which  so  unwillingly  he  paid  him.  Any  shade  of  doubt,  such  as 
could  have  justified  Lord  Clarendon  in  suspending  this  gift,  would 
have  been  eagerly  snatched  at.  Such  a  shade,  therefore,  there  was 
not.  Meantime  the  whole  of  this  reasoning  rests  upon  a  false 
assumption :  Dr.  Gauden  did  not  owe  his  bishopric  to  a  belief  (true 
or  false)  that  he  had  written  the  *  Eicon.*  The  bishopric  was  given 
on  another  account :  consequently  it  cannot,  in  any  way  of  using  the 
fact,  at  all  affect  the  presumptious,  small  or  great,  which  may  exist 
f^parately  for  or  against  the  doctor's  claim  on  that  head. 
20 


306 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


Wordsworth's  most  temperate  and  even  philosophic  habits 
of  life.  So  peculiarly  indeed  was  Captain  Wordsworth's 
temperament  and  demeanor,  and  the  whole  system  of  his 
life,  colored  by  a  grave  and  meditative  turn  of  thought, 
that,  amongst  his  brother  officers  in  the  Honorable  Com- 
pany's service,  he  bore  the  sirname  of  'The  Philosopher.' 
And  William  Wordsworth,  the  poet,  not  only  spoke  of  him 
always  with  a  sort  of  respect,  that  argued  him  to  have 
been  no  ordinary  man,  but  he  has  frequently  assured  me 
of  one  fact  which,  as  implying  some  want  of  frankness 
and  sincerity,  gave  me  pain  to  hear  —  viz.  that  in  the  fine 
lines  entitled,  '  The  Happy  Warrior,'  in  which  an  analyti- 
cal account  is  given  of  the  main  elements  which  enter 
into  the  composition  of  a  real  hero,  he  had  in  view  chiefly 
his  brother  John's  character.  That  was  true,  I  dare  say ; 
but  it  was  inconsistent,  in  some  measure,  with  the  note 
attached  to  the  lines,  by  which  the  reader  learns,  that 
it  was  out  of  reverence  for  Lord  Nelson,  as  one  who 
transcended  the  estimate  here  made,  that  the  poem  had 
not  been  openly  connected  with  his  name,  as  the  real  sug- 
gester  of  the  thoughts.  Now,  privately,  though  still  pro- 
fessing a  lively  admiration  for  the  mighty  Admiral,  as  one 
of  the  few  men  who  carried  into  his  professional  labors  a 
real  and  vivid  genius,  (and  thus  far  Wordsworth  often  tes- 
tified a  deep  admiration  for  Lord  N.)  yet,  in  reference  to 
these  particular  lines,  he  uniformly  declared  that  Lord  N. 
was  much  below  the  ideal  there  contemplated,  and  that, 
in  fact,  it  had  been  suggested  by  the  recollection  of  his 
brother.  But,  surely,  in  some  of  the  first  passages,  this 
cannot  be  so ;  for  example,  when  he  makes  it  one  trait  of 
the  heaven-born  hero,  that  he,  if  called  upon  to  face  some 
loighty  day  of  battle  — 

*  To  which  heaven  has  join'd 
Great  issues,  good  or  bad,  for  human  kind  — 


WILLIAM  TV  ORDSWORTH. 


SOT 


Is  happy  as  a  lover,  and  attired 

With  a  supernal  brightness,  like  a  man  inspir'd  *  — 

Buraly  lie  must  have  had  Lord  Nelson's  idea  predominating 
in  his  thoughts ;  for  Captain  Wordsworth  was  scarcely 
tried  in  such  a  situation.  There  can  be  no  doubt,  how- 
ever, that  he  merited  the  praises  of  his  brother ;  and  it 
was  indeed  an  improbable  tale,  that  he  should  first  of  all 
deviate  from  this  philosophic  temperance  upon  an  occasion 
when  all  his  energies,  and  the  fullest  self-possession,  were 
all  likely  to  prove  little  enough.  In  reality  it  was  the 
pilot,  the  incompetent  pilot,  who  caused  the  fatal  catas- 
trophe :  — '  O  pilot,  you  have  ruined  me  ! '  were  amongst 
the  last  words  that  Captain  Wordsworth  was  heard  to 
utter  —  pathetic  words,  and  fit  for  him,  '  a  meek  man  and 
a  brave,'  to  use  in  addressing  a  last  reproach,  and  summing 
up  the  infinite  injury,  to  one  who,  not  through  misfortune 
or  overruling  will  of  Providence,  but  through  miserable 
conceit  and  unprincipled  levity,  had  brought  total  ruin 
upon  so  many  a  gallant  countryman.  Captain  Words- 
worth might  have  saved  his  own  life ;  but  the  perfect 
loyalty  of  his  nature  to  the  claims  upon  him,  that  sublime 
fidelity  to  duty  which  is  so  often  found  amongst  men  of  his 
profession,  kept  him  to  the  last  upon  the  wreck ;  and, 
after  that,  it  is  probable  that  the  almost  total  wreck  of 
his  own  fortunes,  (which,  but  for  this  overthrow,  would 
have  amounted  to  twenty  thousand  pounds,  upon  the  suc- 
cessful termination  of  this  one  voyage,)  but  still  more,  the 
total  ruin  of  the  new  and  splendid  Indiaman  confided  to 
his  care,  had  so  much  dejected  his  spirits,  that  he  was  not 
in  a  condition  for  making  the  efforts  that,  under  a  more 
hopeful  prospect,  he  might  have  been  able  to  make.  Six 
weeks  his  body  lay  unrecovered ;  at  the  end  of  that  time 
it  was  found,  and  carried  tc  the  Isle  of  Wight,  and  buried 
ir  close  neighborhood  to  the  quiet  fields  which  he  had  so 


308 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


recently  described,  in  letters  to  his  family  at  Grasmere,  as 
a  Paradise  of  English  peace,  to  which  his  mind  would  be 
likely  oftentimes  to  revert,  amidst  the  agitations  of  the 
sea. 

Such  were  the  modes  of  life  pursued  by  three  of  the 
orphan  children  —  such  the  termination  of  life  to  two. 
Meantime,  the  daughter  of  the  house  was  reared  liberally, 
in  the  family  of  a  relation  at  Windsor ;  and  she  might 
have  pursued  a  quiet  and  decorous  career,  of  a  character, 
perhaps,  somewhat  tame,  under  the  same  dignified  auspi- 
ces ;  but  at  an  early  period  of  life  her  good  angel  threw 
open  to  her  a  life  of  nobler  prospects,  in  the  opportunity 
which  then  arose,  and  which  she  did  not  hesitate  to  seize, 
of  becoming  the  companion,  through  a  life  of  delightful 
wanderings  —  of  what,  to  her  more  elevated  friends, 
seemed  nothing  short  of  vagrancy  —  the  companion  and 
the  confidential  friend,  and,  with  a  view  to  the  enlarge- 
ment of  her  own  intellect,  the  pupil  of  a  brother,  the 
most  original  and  most  meditative  man  of  his  own  age. 
William  had  passed  his  infancy  on  the  very  margin  of  the 
Lake  district,  just  six  miles,  in  fact,  beyond  the  rocky 
screen  of  Whinlatter,  and  within  one  hour's  ride  of 
Bassinthwaite  Water.  To  those  who  live  in  the  tame 
scenery  of  Cockermouth,  the  blue  mountains  in  the 
distance,  the  sublime  peaks  of  Borrowdale  and  of  Butter- 
mere,  raise  aloft  a  signal,  as  it  were,  of  a  new  country,  a 
country  of  romance  and  mystery,  to  which  the  thoughts 
are  habitually  turning.  Children  are  fascinated  and 
haunted  with  vague  temptations,  when  standing  on  the 
frontiers  of  such  a  foreign  land  ;  and  so  was  Wordsworth 
fascinated,  so  haunted.  Fortunate  for  Wordsworth  that, 
at  an  early  age,  he  was  transferred  to  the  very  centre  of 
this  lovely  district.  At  the  little  town  of  Hawkshead, 
leated  on  the  north-west  angle  of  Esthwaite  Water,  a 


WILLIAM  WORDSWORTH. 


309 


grammar  school  (which,  in  English  usage,  means  a  school 
for  classical  literature)  was  founded,  in  Queen  Elizabeth's 
reign,  by  Archbishop  Sandys,  a  member  of  a  very  ancient 
family  of  that  name,  still  seated  in  the  neighborhood. 
Hither  were  sent  all  the  four  brothers  ;  and  here  it  was 
that  Wordsworth  passed  his  life  until  the  time  arrived  for 
his  removal  to  college.  Taking  into  consideration  the 
peculiar  tastes  of  the  person,  and  the  peculiar  advantages 
of  the  place,  I  conceive  that  no  pupil  of  a  public  school 
can  ever  have  passed  a  more  luxurious  boyhood  than 
Wordsworth.  The  school  discipline  was  not,  I  believe, 
very  strict ;  the  mode  of  living  out  of  school  very  much 
resembled  that  of  Eton  for  Oppidans  ;  less  elegant  per- 
haps, and  less  costly  in  its  provisions  for  accommodation, 
but  not  less  comfortable  ;  and  in  that  part  of  the  arrange- 
ments which  was  chiefly  Etonian,  even  more  so  ;  for  in 
both  places  the  boys,  instead  of  being  gathered  into  one 
fold,  and  at  night  into  one  or  two  huge  dormitories,  were 
distributed  amongst  motherly  old  '  dames,'  technically  so 
called  at  Eton,  but  not  at  Hawkshead.  In  the  latter  place, 
agreeably  to  the  inferior  scale  of  the  whole  establishment, 
the  houses  were  smaller,  and  more  cottage-like,  conse- 
quently more  like  private  households ;  and  the  old  lady  of 
the  menage  was  more  constantly  amongst  them,  providing, 
with  maternal  tenderness  and  with  a  professional  pride,  for 
the  comfort  of  her  young  flock,  and  protecting  the  weak 
from  oppression.  The  humble  cares  to  which  these  poor 
matrons  dedicated  themselves,  may  be  collected  from 
several  allusions  scattered  through  the  poems  of  Words- 
worth ;  that  entitled  '  Nutting,'  for  instance,  in  which  his 
own  early  Spinosistic  feeling  is  introduced,  of  a  mysterious 
presence  difl'used  through  the  solitudes  of  woods,  a  pres- 
fnce  that  was  disturbed  by  the  intrusion  of  careless  and 
noisy  outrage,  and  which  is  brought  into  a  strong  relief  by 


310 


LITERivilY  REMINISCENCES. 


the  previous  homely  picture  of  the  old  housewife  equip* 
ping  her  young  charge  with  beggars'  weeds  in-  order  to 
prepare  him  for  a  struggle  with  thorns  and  brambles. 
Indeed,  not  only  the  moderate  rank  of  the  boys,  and  the 
peculiar  kind  of  relation  assumed  by  these  matrons, 
equally  suggested  this  humble  class  of  motherly  atten- 
tions, but  the  whole  spirit  of  the  place  and  neighborhood 
was  favorable  to  an  old  English  homeliness  of  domestic 
and  personal  economy.  Hawkshead,  most  fortunately  for 
its  own  manners  and  the  primitive  style  of  its  habits  even 
to  this  day,  stands  about  six  miles  out  of  the  fashionable 
line  for  the  'Lakers.' 

Esthwaite,  though  a  lovely  scene  in  its  summer  garni- 
ture of  woods,  has  no  features  of  permanent  grandeur  to 
rely  upon.  A  wet  or  gloomy  day,  even  in  summer, 
reduces  it  to  little  more  than  a  wildish  pond,  surrounded 
by  miniature  hills  :  and  the  sole  circumstances  which 
restore  the  sense  of  a  romantic  region  and  an  alpine 
character,  are  the  knowledge  (but  not  the  sense)  of 
endless  sylvan  avenues,  ^stretching  for  twenty  miles  to 
the  seaside,  and  the  towering  groups  of  Langdale  and 
Grasmere  fells,  w^hich  look  over  the  little  pastoral  barriers 
of  Esthwaite  from  distances  of  eight,  ten,  and  fourteen 
miles.  Esthwaite,  therefore,  being  no  object  for  itself, 
and  the  sublime  head  of  Coniston  being  accessible  by  a 
road  which  evades  Hawkshead,  few  tourists  ever  trouble 
the  repose  of  this  little  village  town.  And  in  the  days  of 
which  I  am  speaking,  (1778-1787,)  tourists  were  as  yet 
few  and  infrequent  to  any  parts  of  the  country.  Mrs. 
Radcliffe  had  not  begun  to  cultivate  the  sense  of  the 
picturesque  in  her  popular  romances  ;  guide-books  with 
'ihe  sole  exception  of  '  Gray's  Posthumous  Letters,'  had 
Aot  arisen  to  direct  public  attention  to  this  domestic 
Calabria  ;  roads  were  rude,  and,  in  many  instances,  no* 


WILLIAM  WORDSWOKTH 


311 


wide  enough  to  admit  post-chaises  ;  but,  above  all,  the 
whole  system  of  travelling  accommodations  was  barbarous 
Rnd  antediluvian  for  the  requisitions  of  the  pampered 
Bouth.  As  yet  the  land  had  rest ;  the  annual  fever  did 
not  shake  the  very  hills  ;  and  (which  was  the  happiest 
immunity  of  the  whole)  false  taste,  the  pseudo-romantic 
rage,  had  not  violated  the  most  awful  solitudes  amongst 
the  ancient  hills  by  opera-house  decorations.  Words- 
worth, therefore,  enjoyed  this  labyrinth  of  valleys  in  a 
perfection  that  no  one  can  have  experienced  since  the 
opening  of  the  present  century.  The  whole  was  one 
paradise  of  virgin  beauty  ;  and  even  the  rare  works  of 
man,  all  over  the  land,  were  hoar  with  the  gray  tints  of 
an  antique  picturesque  ;  nothing  was  new,  nothing  was 
raw  and  uncicatrized.  Hawkshead,  in  particular,  though 
tamely  seated  in  itself  and  its  immediate  purlieus,  has  a 
most  fortunate  and  central  locality,  as  regards  the  best  (at 
least  the  most  interesting)  scenes  for  a  pedestrian  rambler. 
The  gorgeous  scenery  of  Borrowdale,  the  austere  sublim- 
ities of  Wastdalehead,  of  Langdalehead,  or  Mardale  ; 
these  are  too  oppressive,  in  their  collossal  proportions  and 
their  utter  solitudes,  for  encouraging  a  perfectly  human 
interest.  Now,  taking  Hawkshead  as  a  centre,  with  a 
radius  of  about  eight  miles,  one  might  describe  a  little 
circular  tract  which  embosoms  a  perfect  net- work  of  little 
valleys  —  separate  wards  or  cells,  as  it  were,  of  one  large 
valley,  walled  in  by  the  great  primary  mountains  of  the 
region.  Grasmere,  Easdale,  Little  Langdale,  Tilber- 
thwaite,  Yewdale,  Elter  Water,  Loughrigg  Tarn,  Skel- 
with,  and  many  other  little  quiet  nooks,  lie  within  a  single 
iivision  of  this  labyrinthine  district.  All  these  are  within 
one  summer  afternoon's  ramble.  And  amongst  these,  for 
the  years  cf  his  boyhood,  lay  the  daily  excursions  of 
Wordsworth. 


312 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


I  do  not  conceive  tliat  Wordsworth  could  have  been  an 
amiable  boy  ;  he  was  austere  and  unsocial,  I  have  reason 
to  think,  in  his  habits ;  not  generous  ;  and,  above  all,  not 
self-denying.  Throughout  his  later  life,  with  all  the 
benefits  of  a  French  discipline  in  the  lesser  charities  of 
social  intercourse,  he  has  always  exhibited  a  marked 
impatience  of  those  particular  courtesies  of  life.  Not  but 
he  was  kind  and  obliging  where  his  services  would  cost 
him  no  exertion ;  but  I  am  pretty  certain  that  no  consider- 
ation would  ever  have  induced  Wordsworth  to  burthen 
himself  with  a  lady's  reticule,  parasol,  shawl,  '  or  anything 
that  was  hers.'  Mighty  must  be  the  danger  which  would 
induce  him  to  lead  her  horse  by  the  bridle.  Nor  would 
he,  without  some  demur,  stop  to  offer  her  his  hand  over  a 
Stile.  Freedom  —  unlimited,  careless,  insolent  freedom 
—  unoccupied  possession  of  his  own  arms  —  absolute 
control  over  his  own  legs  and  motions  —  these  have 
always  been  so  essential  to  his  comfort,  that  in  any  case 
where  they  were  likely  to  become  questionable,  he  would 
have  declined  to  make  one  of  the  party.  Meantime,  wa 
are  not  to  suppose  that  Wordsworth,  the  boy,  expressly 
sought  for  solitary  scenes  of  nature  amongst  woods  and 
mountains,  with  a  direct  conscious  anticipation  of  imagi- 
native pleasure,  and  loving  them  with  a  pure,  disinterested 
love,  on  their  own  separate  account.  These  are  feel- 
ings beyond  boyish  nature,  or,  at  all  events,  beyond 
boyish  nature  trained  amidst  the  necessities  of  social  inter- 
course. Wordsworth,  like  his  companions,  haunted  the 
hills  and  the  vales  for  the  sake  of  angling,  snaring  birds, 
swimming,  and  sometimes  of  hunting,  according  to  the 
Westmoreland  fashion,  on  foot ;  for  riding  to  the  chase  is 
^uite  impossible,  from  the  precipitous  nature  of  the  ground. 
It  was  in  the  course  of  these  pursuit,  by  an  indirect  effect 
growing  gradually  upon  him,  that  Wordsworth  became  a 


WILLIAM  WORDSWORTH. 


313 


passionate  lover  of  nature,  at  the  time  when  the  growth  of 
his  intellectual  faculties  made  it  possible  that  he  should 
combine  those  thoughtful  passions  with  the  experience  of 
the  eye  and  the  ear. 

There  is,  amongst  the  poems  of  Wordsworth,  one  most 
ludicrously  misconstrued  by  his  critics,  which  offers  a 
philosophical  hint  upon  this  subject  of  great  instruction. 
I  will  preface  it  with  the  little  incident  which  first  led 
Wordsworth  into  a  commentary  upon  his  own  meaning. 
One  night,  as  often  enough  happened,  during  the  Penin- 
sular war,  he  and  I  had  walked  up  Dunmail  Raise,  from 
Grasmere,  about  midnight,  in  order  to  meet  the  carrier 
who  brought  the  London  newspapers,  by  a  circuitous 
course  from  Keswick.  The  case  was  this  :  —  ColeridgCj 
for  many  years,  received  a  copy  of  the  Courier,  as  a 
mark  of  esteem,  and  in  acknowledgment  of  his  many 
contributions  to  it,  from  one  of  the  proprietors,  Mr.  Daniel 
Stewart.  This  went  up  in  any  case,  let  Coleridge  be 
where  he  might,  to  Mrs.  Coleridge  ;  for  a  single  day,  it 
staid  at  Keswick,  for  the  use  of  Southey  ;  and,  on  the 
next,  it  came  on  to  Wordsworth,  by  the  slow  conveyance 
of  a  carrier,  plying  with  a  long  train  of  cars  between 
Whitehaven  and  Kendal.  Many  a  time  the  force  of  the 
storms  or  floods  would  compel  the  carrier  to  stop  on  his 
route,  five  miles  short  of  Grasmere,  at  W ythburn,  or  even 
eight  miles  short,  at  Legberthwaite.  But,  as  there  was 
always  hope  until  one  or  two  o'clock  in  the  morning, 
often  and  often  it  would  happen  that,  in  the  deadly  impa- 
tience for  earlier  intelligence,  Wordsworth  and  I  would 
walk  off  to  meet  him  about  midnight,  to  a  distance  of 
three  or  four  miles.  Upon  one  of  these  occasions,  when 
some  great  crisis  in  Spain  was  daily  apprehended,  we  had 
waited  for  an  hour  or  more,  sitting  upon  one  of  the  many 
huge  blocks  of  stone  which  lie  scattered  over  that  narro\f 


314 


LITEKARY  EEMINISCENCES. 


field  of  battle  en  the  desolate  frontier  of  Cumberland  and 
Westmoreland,  where  King  Dun  Mail,  with  all  his  peer- 
age, fell,  more  than  a  thousand  years  ago.  The  time  had 
arrived,  at  length,  that  all  hope  for  that  night  had  left  us : 
no  sound  came  up  through  the  winding  valleys  that 
stretched  to  the  north ;  and  the  few  cottage  lights, 
gleaming,  at  wide  distances,  from  recesses  amidst  the 
rocky  hills,  had  long  been  extinct.  At  intervals,  Words- 
worth had  stretched  himself  at  length  on  the  high  road, 
applying  his  ear  to  the  ground,  so  as  to  catch  any  sound 
of  wheels  that  might  be  groaning  along  at  a  distance. 
Once,  when  he  was  slowly  rising  from  this  effort,  his  eye 
caught  a  bright  star  that  was  glittering  between  the  brow 
of  Seat  Sandal,  and  of  the  mighty  Helvellyn.  He  gazed 
upon  it  for  a  minute  or  so  ;  and  then,  upon  turning  away 
to  descend  into  Grasmere,  he  made  the  following  explana- 
tion :  —  'I  have  remarked,  from  my  earliest  days,  that 
if,  under  any  circumstances,  the  attention  is  energetically 
braced  up  to  an  act  of  steady  observation,  or  of  steady 
expectation,  then,  if  this  intense  condition  of  vigilance 
should  suddenly  relax,  at  that  moment  any  beautiful,  any 
impressive  visual  object,  or  collection  of  objects,  falling 
upon  the  eye,  is  carried  to  the  heart  with  a  power  not 
known  under  other  circumstances.  Just  now,  my  ear 
was  placed  upon  the  stretch,  in  order  to  catch  any  sound 
of  wheels  that  might  come  down  upon  the  Lake  of 
Wythburn  from  the  Keswick  road  :  at  the  very  instanf 
when  I  raised  my  head  from  the  ground,  in  final  abandon- 
ment of  hope  for  this  night,  at  the  very  instant  when  the 
organs  of  attention  were  all  at  once  relaxing  from  their 
tension,  the  bright  star  hanging  in  the  air  above  those 
outlines  of  massy  blackness,  fell  suddenly  upon  my  eye, 
And  penetrated  my  capacity  of  apprehension  with  a 
pathos  and  a  sense  of  the  Infinite,  that  would  not  have 


William:  wordsworth. 


315 


irrested  me  under  other  circumstances.'  He  then  went 
on  to  illustrate  the  same  psychological  principle  from 
another  instance  ;  it  was  an  instance  derived  from  that 
exquisite  poem,  in  which  he  describes  a  mountain  boy 
planting  himself  at  twilight  on  the  margin  of  some  soli- 
tary bay  of  Windermere,  and  provoking  the  owls  to  a 
contest  with  himself,  by  '  mimic  hooting,'  blown  through 
his  hands  ;  which  of  itself  becomes  an  impressive  scene 
to  any  one  able  to  realize  to  his  fancy  the  various  elements 
of  the  solitary  woods  and  waters,  the  solemn  vesper  hour, 
the  solitary  bird,  the  solitary  boy.  Afterwards,  the  poem 
goes  on  to  describe  the  boy  as  waiting,  amidst  '  the  pauses 
of  his  skill,'  for  the  answers  of  the  birds  —  waiting  with 
intensity  of  expectation  —  and  then,  at  length,  when,  after 
waiting  to  no  purpose,  his  attention  began  to  relax  —  that 
is,  in  other  words,  under  the  giving  way  of  one  exclusive 
direction  of  his  senses,  began  suddenly  to  allow  an 
admission  to  other  objects — then,  in  that  instant,  the 
scene  actually  before  him,  the  visible  scene,  would  entej 
unawares  — 

*  With  all  its  solemn  imagery  '  — 
This  complex  scenery  was  —  What  ? 

*  Was  carried  far  into  his  heart. 
With  all  its  pomp,  and  that  uncertain  heav'n  received 
Into  the  bosom  of  the  steady  lake.' 

This  very  expression,  '  far,'  by  which  space  and  its 
infinities  are  attributed  to  the  human  heart,  and  to  its 
capacities  of  re-echoing  the  sublimities  of  nature,  has 
dways  struck  me  as  with  a  flash  of  sublime  revelation. 
On  this,  however,  Wordsworth  did  not  say  anything  in  his 
commentary  ;  nor  did  he  notice  the  conclusion,  which  is 
this.  After  describing  the  efi*orts  of  the  boy,  and  next  the 
passive  state  which  succeeded,  under  his  disappointment, 


316 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES, 


(in  which  condition  it  was  that  the  solemn  spectacle 
entered  the  boy's  mind  with  effectual  power,  and  with  a 
semi-conscious  sense  of  its  beauty  that  would  not  be 
denied,)  the  poet  goes  on  to  say  — 

*  And  I  suppose  that  I  have  stood 
A  full  half  hour  beside  his  quiet  grave, 
Mute  —  for  he  died  when  he  was  ten  years  old.' 

Wherefore,  then,  did  the  poet  stand  in  the  village 
churchyard  of  Hawkshead,  wrapt  in  a  trance  of  reverie, 
over  the  grave  of  this  particular  boy  ?  '  It  was,'  says 
Lord  Jeffrey,  'for  that  single  accomplishment'  —  viz.  the 
accomplishment  of  mimicking  the  Windermere  owls  so 
well  that  not  men  only  —  Coleridge,  for  instance,  or 
Professor  Wilson,  or  other  connoisseurs  of  owl-music  — 
might  have  been  hoaxed,  but  actually  the  old  birds  them- 
selves, grave  as  they  seem,  were  effectually  humbugged 
into  entering  upon  a  sentimental  correspondence  of  love 
or  friendship  —  almost  regularly  '  duplying,'  '  replying,' 
and  '  quadruplying,'  (as  Scotch  law  has  it,)  to  the  boy's 
original  theme.  But  here,  in  this  solution  of  Lord 
Jeffrey's,  there  is,  at  all  events,  a  dismal  oversight ;  for  it 
is  evident  to  the  most  careless  reader  that  the  very  object 
^f  the  poem  is  not  the  first  or  initial  stage  of  the  boy's 
history  —  the  exercise  of  skill  which  led  him,  as  an 
occasion,  into  a  rigid  and  tense  effort  of  attention  —  not 
this,  but  the  second  stage,  the  consequence  of  that  atten- 
tion. Even  the  attention  was  an  effect,  a  derivative 
state ;  but  the  second  stage,  upon  which  the  poet  fixes  his 
object,  is  an  effect  of  that  effect ;  and  it  is  clear  that  the 
original  notice  of  the  boy's  talent  is  introduced  only  as  a 
conditio  sine  qua  non  —  a  notice  without  which  a  particu 
t'ar  result  (namely,  the  tense  attention  of  expectation^ 
could  not  have  been  made  Intelligible  ;  as,  again,  without 


WILIiIAM  WORDSWORTH. 


317 


this  result  being  notired,  the  reaction  of  that  action  could 
quite  as  little  have  been  made  intelligible.  Else,  and  but 
for  this  conditional  and  derivative  necessity,  but  for  this 
dependency  of  the  essential  circumstance  upon  the  boy's 
power  of  mimicry,  it  is  evident  that  the  'accomplish- 
ment'—  which  Lord  Jeffrey  so  strangely  supposes  to 
have  been  the  main  object  of  the  poet  in  recording  the 
boy,  and  the  main  subject  of  his  reverie  by  the  side  of 
his  grave  —  never  would  have  been  noticed.  It  is  diffi- 
cult, indeed,  to  conceive  a  stronger  evidence  of  that 
incoherency  of  thought  under  which  Lord  Jeffrey  must 
have  allowed  himself  to  read  Wordsworth,  than  this  very 
blunder. 

But,  leaving  his  Lordship,  what  was  the  subject  of  the 
poet's  reverie  ?  some  reader  may  say.  A  poem  ought  to 
explain  itself ;  and  we  cannot  for  a  moment  admit,  as  a 
justifying  subject  for  reverie,  any  private  knowledge 
which  the  poet  might  happen  to  have  of  the  boy's  char- 
acter, or  of  the  expectations  he  had  chanced  to  raise 
amongst  his  friends.  I  will  endeavor  to  say  a  word  on 
this  question ;  but,  that  I  may  not  too  much  interrupt  the 
narration,  in  a  note.  At  the  same  time,  let  me  remind 
the  reader  of  one  great  and  undeniable  truth  :  it  is  a  fact 
which  cannot  be  controverted,  except  by  the  very  thought- 
less and  the  very  unobserving,  that  scarcely  one  in  a 
thousand  of  impassioned  cases,  scarcely  one  effect  in  a 
;liousand  of  all  the  memorable  effects  produced  by  poets, 
can,  upon  any  theories,  yet  received  amongst  us,  be  even 
imperfectly  explained.  And,  especially,  this  is  true  of 
original  poetry.  The  cases  are  past  numbering  in  which 
the  understanding  says,  or  seems  to  say,  one  thing,  impas- 
sioned nature  another  ;  and,  in  poetry,  at  least,  Cicero's 
great  rule  will  be  found  to  fail  —  that  '  nunquam  aliud 
natura,  aliud  sapientia  dicit  ; '  if,  at  least,  we  understand 


318 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


sapientia  to  mean  dispassionate  good  sense.  How,  fol 
instance,  could  plain  good  sense  —  how  could  the  very 
finest  understanding  —  have  told  any  man,  beforehand, 
that  lovo  in  excess,  amongst  its  other  modes  of  wayward- 
ness, was  capable  of  prompting  such  appellations  as  that 
of  '  wretch  '  to  the  beloved  object?  Yet,  as  a  fact,  as  an 
absolute  fact  of  the  experience,  it  is  undeniable  that  it  is 
among  the  impulses  of  love,  in  extremity,  to  clothe  itself 
in  the  language  of  disparagement  —  why,  is  yet  to  be 
explained. 

*  Perhaps  'tis  pretty 
To  mutter  and  mock  a  broken  charm ; 
To  dally  with  wrong  that  does  no  harm; 
Perhaps  'tis  pretty  to  tie  together 
Thoughts  so  all  unlike  each  other; 
To  feel,  at  each  wild  word,  within, 
A  sweet  recoil  of  love  and  pity. 
And  what  if,  in  a  world  of  sin,*  &c.  &c. 

That  is  Coleridge's  solution  ;  and  the  amount  of  it  is  — 
first,  that  it  is  delightful  to  call  up  what  we  know  to  be  a 
mere  mimicry  of  evil,  in  order  to  feel  its  non-reality  ;  to 
dally  with  phantoms  of  pain  that  do  not  exist :  secondly, 
that  such  language  acts  by  way  of  contrast,  making  the 
love  more  prominent  by  the  contradictoriness  of  its 
expression  :  thirdly,  that  in  a  world  of  sin,  where  evil 
passions  are  so  often  called  into  action,  and  have  thus 
matured  the  language  of  violence  in  a  service  of  malig- 
nity, naturally  enough  the  feeling  of  violence  and  excess 
stumbles  into  its  old  forms  of  expression,  even  when  the 
excess  happens  to  lie  in  the  very  opposite  direction.  All 
this  seems  specious,  and  is  undoubtedly  some  part  of  the 
jiolution  ;  and  the  verses  are  so  fancifully  beautiful,  that 
they  would  recommend  even  a  worse  philosophy.  But, 
after  all,  I  doubt  if  the  whole  philosophy  be  given  :  and 
»r.  a  similar  attempt  of  Charles  Lamb's,  the  case  is  not  sc 


WILLIAM  WORDSWOKTH. 


319 


much  solved  as  further  illustrated  and  amplified.  Finally, 
if  solved  completely,  this  case  is  but  one  of  multitudes 
which  are  furnished  by  the  English  drama  :  but  (and  1 
would  desire  no  better  test  of  the  essential  inferiority, 
attaching  to  the  French  drama  —  no  better  argument  of 
its  having  grown  out  of  a  radically  lower  nature)  there  is 
not,  from  first  to  last,  throughout  that  vaunted  field  of  the 
I'rench  literature,  one  case  of  what  I  may  denominate  the 
antinomies  of  passion  —  cases  of  self-conflict,  in  which 
the  understanding  says  one  thing,  the  impassioned  nature 
of  man  says  another  thing.  This  is  a  great  theme,  how- 
ever, and  I  dismiss  it  to  a  separate  discussion. 

So  far,  however,  as  I  have  noticed  it,  this  question 
has  arisen  naturally  out  of  the  account,  as  I  was  endeavor- 
ing to  sketch  it,  of  Wordsworth's  attachment  to  nature  in 
her  grandest  forms.  It  grew  out  of  solitude  and  the 
character  of  his  own  mind ;  but  the  mode  of  its  growth 
was  indirect  and  unconscious,  and  in  the  midst  of  other 
more  boyish  or  more  worldly  pursuits ;  and  that  which 
happened  to  the  boy  in  mimicking  the  owls  happened  also 
to  him.  In  moments  of  watching  for  the  passage  of 
woodcocks  over  the  hills  in  moonlight  nights,  in  order  that 
he  might  snare  them,  oftentimes  the  dull  gaze  of  expec- 
tation, after  it  vvas  becoming  hopeless,  left  him  liable  to 
effects  of  mountain  scenery  under  accidents  of  nightly 
fdlence  and  solitude,  which  impressed  themselves  with  a 
depth  for  which  a  full  tide  of  success  would  have  allowed 
no  opening.  And,  as  he  lived  and  grew  amongst  such 
Bcenes  from  childhood  to  manhood,  many  thousands  of 
Buch  opportunities  had  leisure  to  improve  themselves  into 
permanent  efiects  of  character,  of  feeling,  and  of  taste. 
Like  Michael,  he  was  in  the  heart  of  many  thousand 
mists.  Many  a  sight,  moreover,  such  as  meets  the  eye 
arely  of  any,  except  those  who  haunt  the  hills  and  the 


LITERARY  BEMINISCENCES. 


tarns  at  all  hours,"^'  and  all  seasons  of  the  year,  had  been 
seen,  and  neglected  perhaps  at  the  time,  but  afterwards 
revisited  the  eye  and  produced  its  appropriate  effect  in 
silent  hours  of  meditation.  In  everything,  perhaps 
except  in  the  redundant  graciousness  of  heart  which 
formed  so  eminent  a  feature  in  the  moral  constitution  of 
that  true  philosopher ;  the  character,  the  sensibility,  and 
the  taste  of  Wordsworth,  pursued  the  same  course  of 
development  as  in  the  education  of  the  Scotch  Pedler,f 

*  In  particular,  and  by  way  of  giving  an  illustration,  let  me  here 
mention  one  of  those  accidental  revelations  that  unfold  new  aspects 
of  nature  :  it  was  one  that  occurred  to  myself.  I  had  gone  up  at  all 
times  of  the  morning  and  the  year,  to  an  eminence,  or  rather  a  vast 
field  of  eminences,  above  Scor  Crag,  in  the  rear  of  Allan  Bank,  a 
Liverpool  gentleman's  mansion,  from  which  is  descried  the  deep  and 
gloomy  valley  of  Great  Langdale.  Not,  however,  for  many  years,  had 
it  happened  that  I  found  myself  standing  in  that  situation  about  four 
o'clock  on  a  summer  afternoon.  At  length,  and  on  a  favorable  day, 
this  accident  occurred;  and  the  scene  which  I  then  beheld,  was  one 
which  I  shall  not  wholly  forget  to  my  dying  day.  The  effects  arose 
from  the  position  of  the  sun  and  of  the  spectator,  taken  in  connection 
with  a  pendulous  mass  of  vapor,  in  which,  however,  were  many  rents 
and  openings,  and  through  them,  far  below,  at  an  abyss-like  depth, 
was  seen  the  gloomy  valley,  its  rare  cottages,  and  *  unrejoicing '  fir- 
trees.  I  had  beheld  the  scene  many  times  before ;  I  was  familiar  with 
its  least  important  features,  but  now  it  was  absolutely  transfigured ; 
it  was  seen  under  lights  and  mighty  shadows,  that  made  it  no  less 
marvellous  to  the  eye  than  that  memorable  creation  amongst  the 
clouds  and  azure  sky,  which  is  described  by  the  Solitary  in  *  The 
Excursion.'  And,  upon  speaking  of  it  to  Wordsworth,  I  found  that 
he  had  repeatedly  witnessed  the  same  impressive  transfiguration  ;  so 
that  it  is  not  evanescent,  but  dependent  upon  fixed  and  recoverable 
combinations  of  time  and  weather. 

t  Amongst  the  various  attempts  to  justify  Wordsworth's  choice  of 
60  humble  and  even  mean  an  occupation  for  his  philosopher,  how 
Btrange  that  the  weightiest  argument  of  all  should  have  been  omitted 
—  viz.  the  privilege  attached  to  his  functions  of  penetrating  without 
offence,  and  naturally,  and  at  periodic  intervals,  to  every  firesile 


WlitlAM  WORDSWORTH. 


321 


who  gives  so  much  of  the  movement  to  the  progress  of 
*  The  Excursion.' 

One  of  the  most  interesting  among  the  winter  amuse- 
ments of  the  Hawkshead  boys  was  that  of  skating  on  the 
adjacent  lake.  Esthwaite  Water  is  not  one  of  the  deep 
lakes,  as  its  neighbors  of  Windermere,  Coniston,  and 
Grasmere  are :  consequently,  a  very  slight  duration  of 
frost  is  sufficient  to  freeze  it  into  a  bearing  strength.  In 
this  respect,  Wordsworth  found  the  same  advantages  in  his 
boyhood  as  afterwards  at  the  University :  for  the  county 
of  Cambridge  is  generally  liable  to  shallow  waters  ;  and 
that  University  breeds  more  good  skaters  than  all  the  rest 
of  England.  About  the  year  1810,  by  way  of  expressing 
an  interest  in  The  Friend,  which  Coleridge  was  just  at 
that  time  publishing  in  weekly  numbers,  Wordsworth  al- 
lowed Coleridge  to  print  an  extract  from  the  poem  on  his 
own  life,  descriptive  of  the  games  celebrated  upon  the  ice 
of  Esthwaite  by  all  who  were  able  to  skate :  the  mimic 
chases  of  hare  and  hounds,  pursued  long  after  the  last 
orange  gleam  of  light  had  died  away  from  the  western 
horizon  —  oftentimes  far  into  the  night  —  a  circumstance 
which  does  not  speak  much  for  the  discipline  of  the 
schools  —  or  rather,  perhaps,  does  speak  much  for  the  ad- 
vantages of  a  situation  so  pure,  and  free  from  the  usual 
perils  of  a  town,  as  this  primitive  village  of  Hawkshead. 
Wordsworth,  in  this  descriptive  passage  —  which  I  wish 
that  I  had  at  this  moment  the  means  of  citing,  in  order 
k)  amplify  my  account  of  his  earliest  tyrocinium  —  speaks 
if  himself  as  frequently  wheeling  aside  from  his  joyous 
companions  to  cut  across  the  image  of  a  star  ;  and  thus 
already,  in  the  midst  of  sportiveness,  and  by  a  movement 
of  sportiveness,  half  unconsciously  to  himself  expressing 
the  growing  necessity  of  retirement  to  his  habits  of 
thought.  At  another  period  of  the  year,  when  the  golden 
21 


S22 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


sammer  allowed  the  students  a  long  season  of  early  play 
before  the  studies  of  the  day  began,  he  describes  himself 
as  roaming  hand-in-hand,  with  one  companion,  along  the 
banks  of  Esthwaite  Water,  chanting,  with  one  voice,  the 
verses  of  Goldsmith  and  of  Gray  —  verses  which,  at  the 
time  of  recording  the  fact,  he  had  come  to  look  upon  as 
either  in  parts  false  in  the  principles  of  their  composition, 
or,  at  any  rate,  as  wofully  below  the  tone  of  high  poetic 
passion  ;  but  which  at  that  time  of  life,  when  the  pro- 
founder  feelings  were  as  yet  only  germinating,  filled  them 
with  an  enthusiasm  which  he  describes  as  brighter  than 
the  dreams  of  fever  or  of  wine. 

Meanwhile,  how  prospered  the  classical  studies  which 
formed  the  main  business  of  Wordsworth  at  Hawkshead  ? 
Not,  in  all  probability,  very  well ;  for,  though  Wordsworth 
is  at  this  day  a  very  sufficient  master  of  the  Latin  lan- 
guage, and  reads  certain  favorite  authors,  especially 
Horace,  with  a  critical  nicety,  and  with  a  feeling  for  the 
felicities  of  his  composition  that  probably  few  have  ever 
felt,  I  have  reason  to  think  that  little  of  this  skill  had  been 
obtained  at  Hawkshead.  As  to  Greek,  that  is  a  language 
which  Wordsworth  has  never  had  energy  enough  to  culti- 
vate with  effect. 

From  Hawkshead,  and  I  believe  after  he  had  entered 
his  eighteenth  year,  (a  time  which  is  tolerably  early  on  the 
English  plan,)  probably  at  the  latter  end  of  the  year 
1 787,  Wordsworth  entered  at  St.  John's  College,  Cam- 
bridge. St.  John's  ranks  as  the  second  college  in  Cam- 
bridge—  the  second  as  to  numbers  and  influence,  and 
general  consideration  ;  in  the  estimation  of  the  Johnians 
as  the  first,  or  at  least  as  coequal  in  all  things  with  Trinity  ; 
from  which,  at  any  rate,  the  general  reader  will  collect, 
that  no  such  absolute  supremacy  is  accorded  to  any  so- 
ciety in  Cambridge  as  in  Oxford  is  accorded  necessarily 


WILLIAM  WORDSWOKTH. 


323 


to  Christ  Cliurch.  The  advantages  of  a  large  college  are 
considerable,  both  to  an  idle  man  who  wishes  to  lurk  un- 
noticed in  the  crowd,  and  to  the  brilliant  man,  whose 
vanity  could  not  be  gratified  by  pre-eminence  amongst  a 
few.  Wordsworth,  though  not  idle  as  regarded  his  own 
pursuits,  was  so  as  regarded  the  pursuits  of  the  place 
With  respect  to  them  he  felt  —  to  use  his  own  words  — 
^hat  his  hour  was  not  come  ;  and  that  his  doom  for  the 
present  was  a  happy  obscurity,  which  left  him,  unvexed  by 
the  torments  of  competition,  to  the  genial  enjoyment  of  his 
life  in  its  most  genial  hours. 

It  will  excite  some  astonishment  when  I  mention  that, 
on  coming  to  Cambridge,  Wordsworth  actually  assumed 
the  beau,  or,  in  modern  slang,  the  '  dandy.'  He  dressed  in 
gilk  stockings,  had  his  hair  powdered  ;  and  in  all  things 
plumed  himself  on  his  gentlemanly  habits.  To  those  who 
remember  the  slovenly  dress  of  his  middle  and  philosophic 
life,  this  will  furnish  matter  for  a  smile. 

Stranger  still  it  is  to  tell,  that,  for  the  first  time  in  his 
life,  Wordsworth  got  '  bouzy  '  at  Cambridge.  It  is  but  fair 
to  add,  that  the  first  time  was  also  the  last  time.  But  per- 
haps the  strangest  part  of  the  story  is  the  occasion  of  this 
drunkenness ;  which  was  in  celebration  of  his  first  visit  to 
the  very  rooms  at  Christ  College  once  occupied  by  Milton 
—  intoxication  by  way  of  homage  to  the  most  temperate 
of  men,  and  this  homage  ofiered  by  one  who  has  turned 
out  himself  to  the  full  as  temperate  !  Still  one  must  grant 
a  privilege  —  and  he  would  be  a  churl  that  could  frown  on 
such  a  claim  —  a  privilege  and  charter  of  large  enthusiasm 
to  such  an  occasion.  And  an  older  man  than  Wordsw^orth, 
at  that  era  not  fully  nineteen,  and  a  man  even  without  a 
Tjoet's  blood  in  his  veins,  might  have  leave  to  forget  his 
sobriety  in  such  circumstances.  Besides  that,  after  all,  I 
have  heard,  from  Wordsworth's  own  lips,  that  he  was  not 


324 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


too  far  gone  to  attend  chapel  decorously  during  the  verj 
acme  of  his  elevation. 

The  rooms  which  Wordsworth  occupied  at  St.  John's 
were  singularly  circumstanced ;  mementos  of  what  is 
highest  and  what  is  lowest  in  human  things  solicited  the 
eye  and  ear  all  day  long.  If  the  occupant  approached 
the  out-doors  prospect  in  one  direction,  there  was  visible 
through  the  great  windows  in  the  adjacent  chapel  of  Trin- 
ity, the  statue  of  Newton  '  with  his  silent  face  and  prism,' 
memorials  of  the  abstracting  intellect,  serene  and  absolute, 
emancipated  from  fleshly  bonds.  On  the  other  hand, 
immediately  below,  stood  the  college  kitchen  ;  and,  in  that 
region,  from  noon  to  dewy  eve,  resounded  the  shrill  voice 
of  scolding  from  the  female  ministers  of  the  head  cook, 
never  suffering  the  mind  to  forget  one  of  the  meanest 
among  human  necessities.  Wordsworth,  however,  as 
one  who  passed  much  of  his  time  in  social  gayety,  was 
less  in  the  way  of  this  annoyance  than  a  profounder 
student  would  have  been.  Probably  he  studied  little 
beyond  French  and  Italian  during  his  Cambridge  life  ;  not 
however  at  any  time  forgetting  (as  I  had  so  much  reason 
to  complain,  when  speaking  of  my  Oxonian  contem- 
poraries) the  literature  of  his  own  country.  It  is  true  that 
he  took  the  regular  degree  of  A.  B.,  and  in  the  regular 
course ;  but  this  was  won  in  those  days  by  a  mere  nominal 
examination,  unless  where  the  mathematical  attainments 
of  the  student  prompted  his  ambition  to  contest  the 
honorable  distinction  of  Senior  Wrangler.  This,  in  com- 
mon with  all  other  honors  of  the  University,  is  won  in 
our  days  with  far  severer  effort  than  in  that  age  of  relaxed 
discipline ;  but  at  no  period  could  it  have  been  won,  let 
the  malicious  and  the  scornful  say  what  they  will,  without 
an  amount  of  mathematical  skill  very  much  beyond  what 
Qas  ever  been  exacted  of  its  alumni  by  any  other  Europeac 


WILLIAM  WORDSWORTH. 


325 


aniversify  Wordsworth  was  a  profound  admirer  of  the 
sublimer  matliematics ;  at  least  of  the  higher  geometry. 
The  secret  of  this  admiration  for  geometry  lay  in  the 
antagonism  between  this  world  of  bodiless  abstraction  and 
the  world  of  passion.  And  here  I  may  mention  appro- 
Driately,  and  I  hope  without  any  breach  of  confidence, 
that,  in  a  great  philosophic  poem  of  Wordsworth's,  which 
is  still  in  MS.,  and  will  remain  in  MS.  until  after  his 
death,  there  is,  at  the  opening  of  one  of  the  books,  a 
dream,  which  reaches  the  very  ne  plus  ultra  of  sublimity 
in  my  opinion,  expressly  framed  to  illustrate  the  eternity 
and  the  independence  of  all  social  modes  or  fashions  of 
existence,  conceded  to  these  two  hemispheres,  as  it  were, 
that  compose  the  total  world  of  human  power  —  mathe- 
matics on  the  one  hand,  poetry  on  the  other. 

« The  one  that  held  acquaintance  with  the  stars, 

 undisturbed  by  space  or  time  ; 

The  other  that  was  a  god  —  yea,  many  gods  — 
Had  voices  more  than  all  the  winds,  and  was 
A  joy,  a  consolation,  and  a  hope.' 

I  scarcely  know  whether  I  am  entitled  to  quote  —  as 
my  memory  (though  not  refreshed  by  a  sight  of  the  poem 
for  more  than  twenty  years)  would  well  enable  me  to  do  — 
any  long  extract ;  but  thus  much  I  may  allowably  say,  as 
it  cannot  in  any  way  affect  Mr.  Wordsworth's  interests, 
that  the  form  of  the  drama  is  as  follows ;  and,  by  the  way, 
even  this  form  is  not  arbitrary ;  but,  with  exquisite  skill 
m  the  art  of  composition,  is  made  to  arise  out  of  the 
situation  in  which  the  poet  had  previously  found  himself, 
and  is  faintly  prefigured  in  the  elements  of  that  situation. 
He  had  been  reading  '  Don  Quixote '  by  the  seaside  ;  and, 
oppressed  by  the  heat  of  the  sun,  he  had  fallen  asleep 
whilst  gazing  on  the  barren  sands  before  him.   He  dreams 


326 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


that,  walking  in  some  sandy  wilderness  of  Africa,  some 
endless  Zahara,  lie  sees,  at  a  distance 

*  An  Arab  of  the  desert,  lance  in  rest. 
Mounted  upon  a  dromedary.' 

The  Arab  rides  forward  to  meet  him ;  and  the  dreamer 
perceives,  in  the  countenance  of  the  rider,  the  agitation  of 
fear,  and  that  he  often  looks  behind  him  in  a  troubled 
way,  whilst  in  his  hand  he  holds  two  books  —  one  of 
which  is  Euclid's  '  Elements  ; '  the  other,  which  is  a  book 
and  yet  not  a  book,  seeming,  in  fact,  a  shell  as  well  as  a 
book,  sometimes  neither,  and  yet  both  at  once.  The  Aral* 
directs  him  to  apply  his  ear ;  upon  which  — 

*  In  an  unknown  tongue,  which  yet  I  understood, 

the  dreamer  says  that  he  heard 

•  A  wild  prophetic  blast  of  harmony, 
An  ode,  as  if  in  passion  utter'd,  that  foretold 
Destruction  to  the  people  of  this  earth 
By  deluge  near  at  hand.* 

The  Arab,  with  grave  countenance,  assures  him  that  it  is 
even  so ;  that  all  was  true  which  had  been  said ;  and  that 
he  himself  was  riding  upon  a  divine  mission,  having  it  in 
charge 

*  To  bury  those  two  books  ; 
The  one  that  held  acquaintance  with  the  stars,'  &c. 

that  is,  in  effect,  to  secure  the  two  great  interests  of  poetry 
and  mathematics  from  sharing  in  the  watery  ruin.  As  he 
talks,  suddenly  the  dreamer  perceives  that  the  Arab^s 

 *  countenance  grew  more  disturb 'd,' 

and  that  his  eye  was  often  reverted;  upon  which  the 
dreaming  poet  also  looks  along  the  desert  in  the  same 
Jirection :  and  in  the  far  horizon  he  descries 


*  a  glittering  light.* 


WILLIAM  WOKDSWOBTH. 


327 


What  IS  it  ?  he  asks  of  the  Arab  rider.  '  It  is,'  said  he, 
» the  waters  of  the  earth,'  that  even  then  were  travelling 
on  their  awful  errand.  Upon  which,  the  poet  sees  thia 
apostle  of  the  desert  riding  off, 

*  With  the  fleet  waters  of  the  world  in  chase  of  him.* 

The  sketch  I  have  here  given  of  this  sublime  dream 
sufficiently  attests  the  interest  which  Wordsworth  took  in 
the  peculiar  studies  of  the  place,  and  the  exalted  privilege 
which  he  ascribed  to  them  of  co-eternity  with  '  the  vision 
and  the  faculty  divine '  of  the  poet  —  the  destiny  common 
to  both,  of  an  endless  triumph  over  the  ruins  of  nature  and 
time.  Meantime,  he  himself  travelled  no  farther  in  these 
studies  than  through  the  six  elementary  books,  usually 
selected  from  the  fifteen  of  Euclid.  Whatever  might  be 
the  interests  of  this  speculative  understanding,  whatever 
his  admiration,  practically  he  devoted  himself  to  the  more 
agitating  interests  of  man,  social  and  political,  just  then 
commencing  that  vast  career  of  revolution  which  has  never 
since  been  still  or  stationary ;  interests  which,  in  his  mind, 
alternated,  however,  with  another  and  different  interest,  in 
the  grander  forms  of  external  nature,  as  found  in  moun- 
tainous regions.  In  obedience  to  this  latter  passion,  it 
was  —  for  a  passion  it  had  become  —  that  during  one  of 
his  long  Cambridge  vacations,  stretching  from  June  to 
November,  he  went  over  to  Switzerland  and  Savoy,  for  a 
pedestrian  excursion  amongst  the  Alps ;  taking  with  him, 

for  his  travelling  companion,  a  certain  Mr.  J  ,  of 

whom  (excepting  that  he  is  once  apostrophized  in  a  son- 
net, written  at  Calais  in  the  year  1802)  I  never  happened 
to  hear  him  speak :  whence  I  presume  to  infer,  that  Mr. 

J  owed  this  flattering  distinction,  not  so  much  to  any 

'ntellectual  graces  of  his  society,  as,  perhaps,  to  his  powers 
administering  '  punishment '  (in  the  language  of  the 


328 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


fancy)  to  restive  and  mutinous  landlords  —  for  such  tverb 
abroad  in  those  days ;  people  who  presented  huge  reckon- 
ings with  one  hand,  and,  with  the  other,  a  huge  cudgel, 
by  way  of  opening  the  traveller's  eyes  to  the  propriety  of 
paying  them  without  demur.  I  do  not  positively  know 
this  to  have  been  the  case ;  but  I  have  heard  Wordsworth 
speak  of  the  ruffian  landlords  who  played  upon  his  youth 
in  the  Grisons ;  and,  however  well  qualified  to  fight  his 
own  battles,  he  might  find,  amongst  such  savage  moun- 
taineers, two  combatants  better  than  one. 

Wordsworth's  route,  on  this  occasion,  lay,  at  first, 
through  Austrian  Flanders,  then  (1788,  I  think)  on  the 
fret  for  an  insurrectionary  war  against  the  capricious 
innov^ations  of  the  Imperial  coxcomb,  Joseph  II.  He 
passed  through  the  camps  then  forming,  and  thence 
ascended  the  Rhine  to  Switzerland ;  crossed  the  great  St* 
Bernard;  visited  the  Lake  of  Como,  and  other  interesting 
scenes  in  the  North  of  Italy,  where,  by  the  way,  thd 
tourists  were  benighted  in  a  forest  —  having,  in  some  way 
or  other,  been  misled  by  the  Italian  clocks,  and  their 
peculiar  fashion  of  striking  round  to  twenty-four  o'clock. 
On  his  return,  Wordsworth  published  a  quarto  pamphlet 
of  verses,  describing,  with  very  considerable  effect  and 
brilliancy,  the  grand  scenery  amongst  which  he  had  been 
moving.  This  poem,  as  well  as  another  in  the  same 
quarto  form,  describing  the  English  lake  scenery  of 
Westmoreland  and  Cumberland,  addressed,  by  way  of 
letter,  '  to  a  young  lady,'  (viz.  Miss  Wordsworth,)  are 
remarkable,  in  the  first  place,  as  the  earliest  efi'ort  of 
Wordsworth  in  verse,  at  least  as  his  earliest  publication  ; 
but,  in  the  second  place,  and  still  more  so,  from  their  style 
of  composition.  '  Pure  description,'  even  where  it  cannot 
be  said,  sneeringly,  '  to  hold  the  place  of  sense,'  is  so  little 
attractive  as  the  direct  or  exclusive  object  of  a  poem,  aiirf 


WILLIAM  AVOBDSWORTH. 


323 


in  reality  it  exacts  so  powerful  an  effort  on  the  part  of  the 
reader  to  realize  visually,  or  make  into  an  apprehensible 
unity  the  scattered  elements  and  circumstances  brought 
together,  that,  inevitably  and  reasonably,  it  can  never 
hope  to  be  a  popular  form  of  composition  ;  else  it  is  highly 
probable  that  these  '  Descriptive  Sketches '  of  "Words- 
worth, though  afterwards  condemned  as  vicious  in  their 
principles  of  composition,  by  his  own  maturer  taste,  would 
really  have  gained  him  a  high  momentary  notoriety  with 
the  public,  had  they  been  fairly  brought  under  its  notice  : 
whilst,  on  the  other  hand,  his  revolutionary  principles  of 
composition,  and  his  purer  taste,  ended  in  obtaining  for 
him  nothing  but  scorn  and  ruffian  insolence.  This  seems 
marvellous  ;  but,  in  fact,  it  is  not  so  :  it  seems,  I  mean, 
prima  facie  marvellous,  that  the  inferior  models  should 
be  fitted  to  gain  a  far  higher  reputation  ;  but  the  secret 
lies  here  —  that  these  were  in  a  taste  which,  though 
frequently  spurious  and  hollow,  had  been  long  reconciled 
to  the  public  feelings,  and  which,  besides,  have  a  specific 
charm  for  certain  minds,  even  apart  from  all  fashions  of 
the  day ;  whereas,  the  other  had  to  struggle  against 
sympathies  long  trained  in  an  opposite  direction,  to  which 
the  recovery  of  a  healthier  tone  (even  where  nature  had 
made  it  possible)  presupposed  a  difficult  process  of  wean- 
ing, and  an  effort  of  discipline  for  reorganizing  the  whole 
internal  economy  of  the  sensibilities,  that  is  both  painful 
and  mortifying  :  for  —  and  that  is  worthy  of  deep  attention 
—  the  misgivings  of  any  vicious  or  unhealthy  state  ;  the 
impulses  and  suspicious  gleams  of  the  truth  struggling 
with  cherished  error  ;  the  instincts  of  light  conflicting  with 
darkness  —  these  are  the  real  causes  of  that  hatred  and 
intolerant  scorn  which  is  ever  awakened  by  the  first  dawn- 
mgs  of  new  and  important  systems  of  truth.  Therefore 
\t  is  that  Christianity  was  so  much  more  hated  than  anj 


330 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


mere  novel  variety  of  error.  Therefore  are  the  first 
feeble  struggles  of  nature  towards  a  sounder  state  of 
health,  always  harsh  and  discordant ;  for  the  false  system 
which  this  change  for  the  better  disturbs,  had,  at  least, 
this  soothing  advantage  —  that  it  was  self-consistent. 
Therefore,  also,  was  the  Wordsworthian  restoration  of 
elementary  power,  and  of  a  higher  or  transcendent  truth 
of  nature,  (or,  as  some  people  vaguely  expressed  the  case, 
o^  simplicity^)  received  at  first  with  such  malignant  dis- 
gust. For  there  was  a  galvanic  awakening  in  the  shock 
of  power,  as  it  jarred  against  the  ancient  system  of  preju- 
dices, which  inevitably  revealed  so  much  of  truth  as  made 
the  mind  jealous  that  all  was  not  right,  and  just  so  far 
affected  as  to  be  dissatisfied  with  its  existing  creed,  but 
not  at  all  raised  up  to  the  level  of  the  new  creed ;  enlight- 
ened enough  to  descry  its  own  wanderings,  but  not  enough 
to  recover  the  right  road. 

The  more  energetic,  the  more  spasmodically  potent  are 
the  throes  of  nature  towards  her  own  re-establishment  in 
the  cases  of  suspended  animation,  by  drowning,  strang- 
ling, (Sec,  the  more  keen  is  the  anguish  of  revival.  And, 
universally,  a  transition  state  is  a  state  of  suffering  and 
disquiet.  Meantime,  the  early  poems  of  Wordsworth, 
that  might  have  suited  the  public  taste  so  much  better 
than  his  more  serious  efforts,  if  the  fashion  of  the  hour, 
or  the  sanction  of  a  leading  review,  or  the  prestige  of  a 
name  in  the  author,  had  happened  to  give  them  a  season's 
currency,  did  in  fact  drop  unnoticed  into  the  market. 
Nowhere  have  I  seen  them  quoted,  no,  not  even  since  the 
author's  victorious  establishment  in  the  public  admiration 
The  reason  may  be,  however,  that  not  many  copies  were 
printed  at  first ;  no  subsequent  edition  was  ever  called  for ; 
and  yet,  from  growing  interest  in  the  author,  every  copi 
Df  the  small  impression  had  been  studiously  bought  \i  ■ 


WILLIAM  WORDSWORTH. 


331 


Indeed,  I  myself  went  to  the  publisliers  (Johnson's)  as 
early  as  1805  or  1806,  and  bought  up  all  the  remaining 
copies,  (which  were  but  six  or  seven  of  the  Foreign 
Sketches,  and  two  or  three  of  the  English,)  as  presents, 
and  as  future  curiosities  in  literature  to  literary  friends, 
whose  interest  in  Wordsworth  might  assure  one  of  a  due 
value  being  put  upon  the  poem.  Were  it  not  for  this 
extreme  scarcity,  I  am  disposed  to  think  that  many  lines 
or  passages  would  long  ere  this  have  been  made  familiar 
to  the  public  ear.  Some  are  delicately,  some  forcibly 
picturesque ;  and  the  selection  of  circumstances  is  occa- 
sionally very  original  and  felicitous.  In  particular,  I 
remember  this  one,  which  presents  an  accident  in  rural 
life  that  must  by  thousands  of  repetitions  have  become 
intimately  known  to  every  dweller  in  the  country,  and  yet 
had  never  before  been  consciously  taken  up  for  a  poet's 
use.  After  having  described  the  domestic  cock  as 
'  sweetly  ferocious  '  —  a  prettiness  of  phraseology  v/hich 
he  borrows  from  an  Italian  author  —  he  notices  those 
competitions  or  defiances  which  are  so  often  carried  on 
nterchangeably  from  great  distances  :  — 

*  Echo'd  by  faintly  answering  farms  remote.' 

This  is  the  beautiful  line  in  which  he  has  caught  and 
preserved  so  ordinary  an  occurrence  —  one,  in  fact,  of 
the  commonplaces,  which  lend  animation  and  a  moral 
interest  to  rural  life. 

After  his  return  from  this  Swiss  excursion,  Wordsworth 
took  up  his  parting  residence  at  Cambridge,  and  prepared 
for  a  final  adieu  to  academic  pursuits  and  academic  society. 

It  was  about  this  period  that  the  French  Revolution 
broke  out;  and  the  reader  who  would  understand  its 
ippalling  effects  —  its  convulsing,  revolutionary  effects 
upon  Wordsworth's  heart  and  soul  —  should  consult  the 


332 


lilTEBARY  REMINISCENCES. 


history  of  the  Solitary,  as  given  by  himself  in  *  The 
Excursion  ;  '  for  that  picture  is  undoubtedly  a  leaf  from 
the  personal  experience  of  Wordsworth  : 

*  From  that  dejection  I  was  roused  — 
But  how  ?  *  &c. 

Mighty  was  the  transformation  which  it  wrought  in  the 
whole  economy  of  his  thoughts  ;  miraculous  almost  was 
the  expansion  which  it  gave  to  his  human  sympathies ; 
chiefly  in  this  it  showed  its  eiBfects  —  in  throwing  the 
thoughts  inwards  into  grand  meditations  upon  man,  his 
final  destiny,  his  ultimate  capacities  of  elevation ;  and, 
secondly,  in  giving  to  the  whole  system  of  the  thoughts 
and  feelings  a  firmer  tone,  and  a  sense  of  the  awful 
realities  which  surround  the  mind;  by  comparison  with 
which  the  previous  literary  tastes  seemed  (even  where 
they  were  fine  and  elegant,  as  in  Collins,  or  Gray,  unless 
where  they  had  the  self-sufficing  reality  of  religion,  as  in 
Cowper)  fanciful  and  trivial.  In  all  lands  this  result  was 
accomplished,  and  at  the  same  time  :  Germany,  above  all^ 
found  her  new  literature  the  mere  creation  and  product  of 
this  great  moral  tempest;  and  in  Germany  or  England 
alike,  the  poetry  was  so  entirely  regenerated,  thrown  into 
moulds  of  thought  and  of  feeling  so  new  —  so  primary  — • 
BO  different  from  the  old  worn-out  channels  in  which  they 
had  been  trained  to  flow  —  that  the  poets  everywhere  felt 
themselves  to  be  putting  away  childish  things,  and  now 
at  length  —  now  first  (as  regarded  the  eighteenth  century) 
entering  upon  the  dignity  and  the  sincere  thinking  of 
mature  manhood. 

Wordsworth,  it  is  well  knowti  to  all  who  know  anything 
of  his  history,  felt  himself  so  fascinated  by  the  gorgeous 
festival  era  of  the  Revolution  —  that  era,  when  the  sleep* 
ing  snakes  which  afterwards  stung  the  national  felicitj 


WILLIAM  WOBDSWORTH. 


333 


were  yet  covered  with  flowers  —  that  he  went  over  to 
Paris,  and  spent  about  one  entire  year  between  that  city, 
Orleans,  and  Blois.  There,  in  fact,  he  continued  to  re- 
ride  almost  too  long.  He  had  been  sufficiently  connected 
with  public  men  to  have  drawn  upon  himself  some  notice 
from  those  who  afterwards  composed  the  Committee  of 
Puplic  Safety.  And,  as  an  Englishman,  when  the  war 
had  once  obliterated  the  too  fervent  and  too  indulgent 
partiality,  which,  at  an  earlier  period  of  the  revolutionary 
movement,  had  settled  upon  the  English  name,  he  became 
an  object  of  gloomy  suspicion  with  those  even  who  would 
have  grieved  that  he  should  fall  a  victim  to  undistinguish- 
ing  popular  violence.  Already  ^br  England,  and  in  her 
behalf,  he  was  thought  to  be  that  spy  which  (as  Mr.  Coler- 
idge tells  us,  in  his  Biographia  Literarid)  afterwards 
he  was  accounted  by  Mr.  Pitt's  emissaries,  in  the  worst 
of  services  against  her.  I  doubt,  however,  (let  me  say 
it,  by  the  way,  without  impeachment  of  Mr.  Coleridge's 
veracity  —  for  he  was  easily  duped,)  this  whole  story 
about  Mr.  Pitt's  Somersetshire  spies ;  and  it  has  often 
struck  me  with  astonishment,  that  Mr.  Coleridge  should 
have  suffered  his  personal  pride  to  take  so  false  a  direc- 
tion as  to  court  the  humble  distinction  of  having  been 
suspected  as  a  spy,  in  those  very  years  when  poor  empty 

tympanies  of  men,  such  as  G  ,  Thelwall,  Holcroft, 

were  actually  recognized  as  enemies  of  the  state,  and 
worthy  of  a  State  surveillance,  by  Ministers  so  blind  and 
grossly  misinformed,  as,  on  this  point,  were  Pitt  and 
Dundas.  Had  I  been  Coleridge,  instead  of  saving  Mr. 
Pitt's  reputation  with  posterity  by  ascribing  to  him  a 
jealousy  which  he  or  his  agents  had  not  the  discernment 
to  cherish,  I  would  have  boldly  planted  myself  upon  the 
Tact,  the  killing  fact,  that  he  had  utterly  despised  both 
myself,  Coleridge  to  wit,  and  Wordsworth — even  with 


834 


LITEBARY  REMINISCENCES. 


Dogberry,  I  would  have  insisted  upon  that  — '  Set  down^ 
also,  that  I  am  an  ass  ! '  I  would  have  exulted  in  this 
fact ;  it  should  have  been  my  glory  —  namely,  tnat  two 
men,  whom,  in  their  intellectual  faculties,  posterity  will 
acknowledge  as  equal  to  any  age,  were  scorned  and 
slighted  as  too  contemptible  for  fear ;  whilst  others,  so 
gross  and  vulgar  in  style  of  mind  as  this  Holcroft,  this 
Thelwall,  this  —  (what  is  his  name?)  —  were  as  brain- 
lessly  feared  by  Mr.  Pitt's  cabinet  as  ever  Bottom  was 
adored  by  Titania.  What  a  perversion  of  pride !  that 
Coleridge  should  have  sought,  by  lending  his  ear  to  fables 
which  Wordsworth's  far  sterner  principle  views  as  lies,* 
to  gain  the  fanciful  honor  of  standing  upon  Mr.  Pitt's 

*  The  reader,  who  may  happen  not  to  have  seen  Mr.  Coleridge's 
Biographia  Literaria,  is  informed  that  Mr.  Coleridge  tells  a  long 
story  about  a  man  who  followed  and  dogged  himself  and  Mr.  Words- 
worth in  all  their  rural  excursions,  under  a  commission  (originally 
emanating  from  Mr.  Pitt)  for  detecting  some  overt  acts  of  treason,  or 
treasonable  correspondence  ;  or,  in  default  of  either,  some  words  of 
treasonable  conversation.  Unfortunately  for  his  own  interests  as  an 
active  servant,  capable  of  bagging  a  promising  amount  of  game, 
within  a  week  or  so,  even  in  a  whole  month,  that  spy  had  collected 
nothing  at  all  as  the  basis  of  a  report,  excepting  only  something 
which  they  (Coleridge  and  Wordsworth,  to  wit,)  were  continually 
saying  to  each  other,  now  in  blame,  now  in  praise,  of  one  Spy  JSTosy  ; 
and  this,  praise  and  blame  alike,  the  honest  spy  very  naturally  took 
to  himself — seeing  that  the  world  accused  him  of  having  a  nose  of 
unreasonable  dimensions,  and  his  own  conscience  accused  him  of 
being  a  spy.  *  Now,'  says  Mr.  Coleridge,  'the  very  fact  was,  that 
Wordsworth  and  I  were  constantly  talking  about  Spinosa.'  This 
Btory  makes  a  very  good  Joe  Miller  ;  but,  for  other  purposes,  is 
somewhat  damaged.  However,  there  is  one  excellent  story  in  the 
case.  Some  country  gentlemen  from  the  neighborhood  of  Nether 
Stowey,  upon  a  party  happening  to  discuss  the  probabilities  that 
Wordsworth  and  Coleridge  might  be  traitors  and  in  correspondence 
with  the  French  Directory,  answered  thus ;  —  *  Oh,  as  to  that  Coler- 
idge, he's  a  rattle-brain  that  will  say  more  in  a  week  than  he  wiL 


WILLIAM  WOEDSWORTH. 


335 


^)Ocket-list  of  traitors  and  French  spies ;  when,  after  all, 
they  stood  confessedly  in  that  list  as  tenth-rate  and  most 
inconsiderable  villains.  Heavens !  that  was  a  strange 
ambition,  that,  rather  than  be  wholly  forgotten  by  Mr. 
Pitt,  (in  which  fate  there  was,  by  possibility,  a  great 
dignity,)  would  seek  to  figure  amongst  the  very  rear- 
guard of  his  traitors ! 

In  France,  however,  Wordsworth  had  a  chance,  in  good 
earnest,  for  passing  for  the  traitor,  that,  in  England,  no 
rational  person  ever  thought  him.  He  had  chosen  his 
friends  carelessly ;  nor  could  any  man,  the  most  saga- 
cious, have  chosen  them  safely,  in  a  time  when  the 
internal  schisms  of  the  very  same  general  party  brought 
with  them  worse  hostilities  and  more  personal  perils  than 
even,  upon  the  broader  divisions  of  party,  could  have 
attended  the  most  ultra  professions  of  anti-national  poli- 
tics, and  when  the  rapid  changes  of  position  shifted  the 
peril  from  month  to  month.  One  individual  is  specially 
recorded  by  Wordsworth,  in  the  poem  on  his  own  life,  as 
a  man  of  the  highest  merit,  and  personal  qualities  the 
most  brilliant,  who  ranked  first  upon  the  list  of  Words- 
worth's friends ;  and  this  man  was  so  far  a  safe  friend,  at 
one  moment,  as  he  was  a  republican  general  —  finally, 
indeed,  a  commander-in-chief.  This  was  Beaupuis ;  and 
the  description  of  his  character  and  position  is  singularly 
interesting.  There  is,  in  fact,  a  special  value  and  a  use 
about  the  case :  it  opens  one's  eyes  feelingly  to  the  fact, 
that,  even  in  this  thoughtless  people,  so  full  of  vanity  and 
levity  —  nevertheless,  the  awful  temper  of  the  times,  and 
the  dread  burthen  of  human  interests  with  which  it  was 

Btand  to  in  a  twelvemonth.  But  Wordsworth  —  that's  the  traitor  ; 
why,  God  bless  me,  he's  so  close  on  the  subject,  that  d — n  me  if 
you'll  ever  hear  him  open  his  hps  on  the  subject  from  year's  end  to 
year's  end  i ' 


336 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


charged  —  had  called  to  a  consciousness  of  new  duties  — 
Qad  summoned  to  an  audit,  as  if  at  some  great  final  tri- 
bunal, even  the  gay,  radiant  creatures  that,  under  less 
solemn  auspices,  under  the  reign  of  a  Francis  I.,  or  a 
Louis  XIV.,  would  have  been  the  merest  painted  butterflies 
of  the  court-sunshine.  This  Beaupuis  was  a  man  of 
superb  person  —  beautiful  in  a  degree  which  made  him  a 
model  of  male  beauty,  both  as  to  face  and  figure ;  and, 
accordingly,  in  a  land  where  conquests  of  that  nature 
were  so  easy,  and  the  subjects  of  so  trifling  an  efibrt,  he 
had  been  distinguished,  to  his  own  as  well  as  the  public 
eyes,  by  a  rapid  succession  of  bonnes  fortunes  amongst 
women.  Such,  and  so  glorified  by  triumphs  the  most 
unquestionable  and  flattering,  had  the  earthquake  of  the 
revolution  found  him.  From  that  moment,  he  had  no 
leisure,  not  a  thought,  to  bestow  upon  his  former  selfish 
and  frivolous  pursuits.  He  was  hurried,  as  one  inspired 
by  some  high  apostolic  passion,  into  the  service  of  the 
unhappy  and  desolate  serfs  amongst  his  own  countrymen 

—  such  as  are  described,  at  an  earlier  date,  by  Madame  de 
Sevigne,  as  the  victims  of  feudal  institutions  ;  and  one 
day  as  he  was  walking  with  Wordsworth  in  the  neighbor- 
hood of  Orleans,  and  they  had  turned  into  a  little  quiet 
lane,  leading  off*  from  a  heath,  suddenly  they  came  upon 
the  following  spectacle  :  —  A  girl,  seventeen  or  eighteen 
years  old,  hunger-bitten,  and  wasted  to  a  meagre  shadow, 
was  knitting,  in  a  dejected,  drooping  way  ;  whilst  to  her 
arm  was  attached,  by  a  rope,  the  horse,  equally  famished, 
that  earned  the  miserable  support  of  her  family.  Beaupuis 
csomprehended  the  scene  in  a  moment ;  and  seizing 
Wordsworth  by  the  arm,  he  said  —  '  Dear  English  friend ! 

—  brother  from  a  nation  of  freemen  !  —  that  it  is  that  is 
the  curse  of  our  people,  in  their  widest  division  ;  and  U 
5ure  this,  it  is,  as  well  as  to  maintain  our  work  agains* 


WILLIAM  WORDSWORTH. 


337 


tlie  kings  of  the  earth,  that  blood  must  be  shed  and  tears 
must  flow  for  many  years  to  come  ! '  At  that  time,  the 
revolution  had  not  fulfilled  its  purposes  ;  as  yet,  the  King 
was  on  the  throne  ;  the  fatal  10th  of  August,  1792,  had 
not  dawned  ;  and,  as  yet,  there  was  safety  for  a  subject 
of  kings. ^'  The  irresistible  stream  was  hurrying  forwards. 
The  King  fell ;  and  (to  pause  for  a  moment)  how  divinely 
is  the  fact  recorded  by  Wordsworth,  in  the  MS.  poem  on 
his  o\vn  life,  placing  the  awful  scenes  past  and  passing  in 
Paris,  under  a  pathetic  relief  from  the  description  of  the 
golden,  autumnal  day,  sleeping  in  sunshine  — 

*  How  little  has  any  adequate  power  as  yet  approached  this  great 
theme  !  Not  the  Grecian  stage  —  not  *  the  dark  sorrows  of  the  line  of 
Thebes,'  in  any  of  its  scenes,  unfolds  such  tragical  grouping  of  cir- 
cumstances and  situations  as  may  be  gathered  from  the  memoirs  of 
the  time.  The  galleries  and  vast  staircases  of  Versailles,  at  early 
dawn,  on  some  of  the  greatest  days  —  the  tempestuous  gathering  of 
the  mobs  —  the  figure  of  the  Duke  of  Orleans  obscurely  detected 
amongst  them  —  the  growing  fury  —  the  growing  panic  —  the  blind 
tumult  —  and  the  dimness  of  the  event  —  all  make  up  a  scene  worthy 
to  blend  with  our  time-hallowed  images  of  Babylon  or  of  Nineveh 
with  the  enemy  in  all  her  gates,  Memphis  or  Jerusalem  in  their 
agonies.  But,  amongst  all  the  exponents  of  the  growing  agitation  that 
besieged  the  public  mind,  none  is  so  profoundly  impressive  as  the 
scene  (every  Sunday  renewed)  at  the  Chapel  Royal.  Even  in  the 
most  penitential  of  the  litanies,  in  the  presence  when  most  imme- 
diately confessed  of  God  himself — when  the  antiphonies  were 
chanted,  one  party  singing,  with  fury  and  gnashing  of  teeth,  Salvum 
fac  regem,  and  another,  with  equal  hatred  and  fervor,  answering 
Et  Reginam  —  the  organ  roared  into  thunder  —  the  semi-chorus 
swelled  into  shouting  —  the  menaces  into  defiance  —  the  agitation  into 
tempestuous  fury  —  again  the  crsk,shing  semi-dioir  sang  with  shouts 
their  Salvum  fac  regem  —  again  the  vengeful  antiphony  hurled  back 
its  Et  Reginam  —  and  one  person,  an  eye-witness  of  these  scenes, 
which  mounted  in  violence  on  each  successive  Sunday,  declares  that, 
oftentimes,  the  semi-choral  bodies  were  at  the  point  of  fighting  with 
each  other  in  the  j  resence  of  the  King, 
22 


S38  LITEKABY  REMINISCENCES. 

« When  I 

Towards  the  fierce  metropolis  bert  my  steps 

The  homeward  road  to  England.    From  his  throne 

The  King  had  faUen  '  — &c. 

What  a  picture  does  he  give  of  the  fury  which  there 
possessed  the  public  mind  ;  of  the  frenzy  which  shone  in 
every  eye,  and  through  every  gesture ;  of  the  stormy 
groups  assembled  at  the  Palais  Royal,  or  the  Tuilleries, 
with  '  hissing  factionists  '  for  ever  in  their  centre,  '  hissing ' 
from  the  self-baffling  of  their  own  madness,  and  incapable 
from  wrath  of  speaking  clearly ;  of  fear  already  creeping 
over  the  manners  of  multitudes  ;  of  stealthy  movements 
through  back  streets  ;  plotting  and  counter-plotting  in 
every  family  ;  feuds  to  extermination,  dividing  children 
of  the  same  house  for  ever  ;  scenes  such  as  those  of  the 
Chapel  Royal,  (now  silenced  on  that  public  stage,) 
repeating  themselves  daily  amongst  private  friends  ;  and, 
to  show  the  universality  of  this  maniacal  possession  — 
that  it  was  no  narrow  storm  discharging  its  fury  by  local 
concentration  upon  a  single  city,  but  that  it  overspread 
the  whole  realm  of  France  —  a  picture  is  given,  wearing 
the  same  features,  of  what  pas?ed  daily  at  Orleans,  Blois, 
and  other  towns.  The  citizens  are  described  in  the 
attitudes  they  assumed  at  the  daily  coming  in  of  the  post 
from  Paris  ;  the  fierce  sympathy  is  portrayed,  with  which 
they  echoed  back  the  feelings  of  their  compatriots  in  the 
capital ;  men  of  all  parties  had  been  there  up  to  this 
time  ;  aristocrats  as  well  as  democrats  —  and  one  in 
particular  of  the  former  class  is  put  forward  as  a  repre- 
sentative of  his  class.  This  man,  duly  as  the  hour 
arrived  which  brought  the  Parisian  newspapers,  read 
restlessly  of  the  tumults  and  insults  amongst  which  the 
Royal  Family  now  passed  their  days  ;  of  the  decrees  by 
which  his  own  order  were  threatened  or  assailed  ;  of  the 


WILLIAM  WORDSWOHTH. 


339 


uelf-expatriation,  now  continually  swelling  in  amount,  as 
a  measure  of  despair  on  the  part  of  myriads,  an  well 
priests  as  gentry  —  all  this  and  worse  he  read  in  public  ; 
and  still  as  he  read, 

•  his  hand 
Haunted  his  sword  like  an  uneasy  spot 
In  his  own  body.' 

In  short,  as  there  never  has  been  so  strong  a  national 
convulsion  diffused  so  widely  with  equal  truth,  it  may  be 
asserted  that  no  describer,  so  powerful,  or  idealizing  so 
magnificently  what  he  deals  with,  has  ever  been  a  leal 
living  spectator  of  parallel  scenes.  The  French,  indeed, 
it  may  be  said,  are  far  enough  from  being  a  people  pro- 
found in  feeling.  True  ;  but  of  all  people,  they  most 
exhibit  their  feeling  on  the  surface  ;  are  the  most  demon' 
strative  (to  use  a  modern  term) ;  and  most  of  all  mark 
their  feelings  by  outward  expression  of  gesticulation  and 
fervent  enunciation  :  not  to  insist  upon  the  obvious  truth 

—  that  even  a  people  of  shallow  feeling  may  be  deeply 
moved  by  tempests  which  uproot  the  forest  of  a  thousand 
years'  growth  ;  by  changes  in  the  very  organization  of 
society,  that  throw  all  things,  for  a  time,  into  one  vast 
anarchy ;  and  by  murderous  passions,  alternately  the 
effect  and  the  cause  of  that  same  chaotic  anarchy.  Now, 
it  was  in  this  autumn  of  1792,  as  I  have  already  said, 
that  Wordsworth  parted  finally  from  his  illustrious  friend 

—  for,  all  things  considered,  he  may  be  justly  so  entitled 

—  the  gallant  Beaupuis.  This  great  season  of  public 
trial  had  searched  men's  natures ;  revealed  their  real 
hearts  ;  brought  into  light  and  action  qualities  oftentimes 
not  suspected  by  their  possessors  ;  and  had  thrown  men, 
d»  in  elementary  states  of  society,  each  upon  his  own 
native  resources,  unaided  by  the  old  conventional  forces 
'^f  rank  and  birth.     Beaupuis  had  shone  to  unusual 


340 


LITEKARY  REMINISCENCES. 


advantage  under  this  general  trial ;  lie  had  discovered, 
even  to  the  philosophic  eye  of  Wordsworth,  a  depth  of 
benignity,  very  unusual  in  a  Frenchman  ;  and  not  of 
local,  contracted  benignity,  but  of  large,  illimitable, 
apostolic  devotion  to  the  service  of  the  poor  and  the 
oppressed  —  a  fact  the  more  remarkable  as  he  had  all 
the  pretensions  in  his  own  person  of  high  birth  and  high 
rank ;  and,  so  far  as  he  had  any  personal  interest 
embarked  in  the  struggle,  should  have  allied  himself  with 
the  aristocracy.  But  of  selfishness  in  any  shape,  he  had 
no  vestiges  ;  or,  if  he  had,  it  showed  itself  in  a  slight 
tinge  of  vanity ;  yet,  no  —  it  was  not  vanity,  but  a 
radiant  quickness  of  sympathy  with  the  eye  which  ex- 
pressed admiring  love  —  sole  relic  of  the  chivalrous 
devotion  once  limited  to  the  service  of  ladies.  Now, 
again,  he  put  on  the  garb  of  chivalry  ;  it  was  a  chivalry 
the  noblest  in  the  world,  which  opened  his  ear  to  the 
Pariah  and  the  oppressed  all  over  his  mis- organized 
country.  A  more  apostolic  fervor  of  holy  zealotry  in 
this  great  cause,  had  not  been  seen  since  the  days  of 
Bartholomew  las  Casas,  who  showed  the  same  excess  of 
feeling  in  another  direction  This  sublime  dedication 
of  his  being  to  a  cause  which,  in  his  conception  of 
it,  extinguished  all  petty  considerations  for  himselt,  and 
made  him  thenceforwards  a  creature  of  the  national 
will  — '  a  son  of  France,'  in  a  more  eminent  and  loftier 
B^^nse  than  according  to  the  heraldry  of  Europe  —  had 
extinguished  even  his  sensibility  to  the  voice  of  worldly 
honor  :  '  injuries,'  says  Wordsworth  — 

*  injuries 
Made  him  more  gracious.* 

And  so  utterly  had  he  submitted  his  own  will  or  separate 
interests  to  the  transcendent  voice  of  his  country,  which, 
m  the  main,  he  believed  to  be  now  speaking  autheijtically 


WILLIAM  WORDSWORTH. 


3il 


for  the  first  time  since  the  foundations  of  Christendom, 
that,  even  against  the  motions  of  his  own  heart,  he  adopted 
the  hatreds  of  the  young  Republic,  growing  cruel  in  his 
purposes  towards  the  ancient  oppressor,  out  of  very  excess 
of  love  for  the  oppressed  ;  and,  against  the  voice  of  his 
own  order,  as  well  as  in  stern  oblivion  of  many  early 
friendships,  he  became  the  champion  of  democracy  in  the 
struggle  everywhere  commencing  with  prejudice  or  feudal 
privilege.  Nay,  he  went  so  fa?  upon  the  line  of  this  new 
crusade  against  the  evils  of  the  world,  that  he  even  ac- 
cepted, with  a  conscientious  defiance  of  his  own  inevitable 
homage  to  the  erring  spirit  of  loyalty  embarked  upon  that 
cause,  a  commission  in  the  Republican  armies  preparing  to 
move  against  La  Vendee  ;  and,  finally,  in  that  cause,  as 
commander-in-chief,  he  laid  down  his  life.  *  He  perished,' 
says  Wordsworth  — 

 •  perished,  fighting  in  supreme  command. 

Upon  the  banks  of  the  unhappy  Loire.' 

Homewards  fled  all  the  English  from  a  land  which  now 
was  fast  filling  its  prisons,  and  making  ready  the  shambles 
for  its  noblest  citizens.  Thither  also  came  Wordsworth  ; 
and  then  he  spent  his  time  for  a  year  and  more,  in  Lon- 
don chiefly,  overwhelmed  with  shame  and  despondency 
for  the  disgrace  and  scandal  brought  upon  liberty  by  the 
atrocities  committed  in  that  holy  name.  Upon  this  subject 
iie  dwells  with  deep  emotion  in  the  poem  on  his  own  life  ; 
and  he  records  the  awful  triumph  for  retribution  accom- 
plished, which  possessed  him  when  crossing  the  sands  of 
the  great  Bay  of  Morecamb  from  Lancaster  to  Ulverstone  ; 
%nd  hearing  from  a  horseman  who  passed  him,  in  reply  to 
his  question  —  Was  there  any  news  ?  —  *  Yes,  that  Robes- 
pierre had  perished.'    Immediately,  a  passion  seized  him, 

transport  of  almost  epileptic  fervor,  prompting  him  as  he 


342 


LITERARY  BEMINISCENCES. 


stood  alone  upon  this  perilous  ^  waste  of  sands,  to  shout 
aloud  anthems  of  thanksgiving  for  this  great  vindication 
of  eternal  justice.  Still,  though  justice  was  done  upon 
one  great  traitor  to  the  cause,  the  cause  itself  was  overcast 
with  clouds  too  heavily  to  find  support  and  employment 
for  the  hopes  of  a  poet  who  had  believed  in  a  golden  era 
ready  to  open  upon  the  prospects  of  human  nature.  It 
gratified  and  solaced  his  heart,  that  the  indignation  of 
mankind  should  have  wreaked  itself  upon  the  chief  mon- 
sters that  had  outraged  their  nature  and  their  hopes  ;  but 
for  the  present  he  found  it  necessary  to  comfort  his  disap- 
pointment, by  turning  away  from  politics  to  studies  less 
capable  of  deceiving  his  expectations. 

From  this  period,  therefore  —  that  is,  from  the  year 
1794-95  —  we  may  date  the  commencement  of  Words- 
worth's entire  self-dedication  to  poetry  as  the  study  and 
main  business  of  his  life.  Somewhere  about  this  period, 
also,  (though,  according  to  my  remembrance  of  what 
Miss  Wordsworth  once  told  me,  I  think  one  year  or  so 
later,)  his  sister  joined  him;  and  they  began  to  keep  house 

*  That  tract  of  the  lake  country  which  stretches  southwards  from 
Hawkshead  and  the  lakes  of  Esthwaite,  Windermere,  and  Coniston,  to 
the  little  town  of  Ulverstone,  (which  may  be  regarded  as  the  metropo- 
lis of  the  little  romantic  English  Calabria,  called  Turness,)  is  divided 
from  the  main  part  of  Lancashire  by  the  estuary  of  Morecamb.  The 
j>ea  retires  with  the  ebb  tide  to  a  vast  distance,  leaving  the  sands 
passable  for  a  few  hours  for  horses  and  carriages.  But  partly  from 
the  daily  variation  in  these  hours,  partly  from  the  intricacy  of  the 
pathless  track  which  must  be  pursued,  and  partly  from  the  galloping 
pace  at  which  the  returning  tide  comee  in,  many  fatal  accidents  are 
continually  occurring  —  sometimes  to  the  too  venturous  traveller 
who  has  slighted  the  aid  of  guides  —  sometimes  to  the  guides  them- 
selves when  baffled  and  perplexed  by  mists.  Gray  the  poet  mentions 
me  of  the  latter  class,  as  having  then  recently  occurred  under  affect- 
ing circumstances.  Local  tradition  records  a  long  list  of  interesting 
Mises. 


WILLIAM  WORDSWORTH. 


313 


together  :  *  once  at  Race  Down,  in  Dorsetshire  ;  once  at 
Clevedon,  on  the  coast  of  Somersetshire  ;  then  amongst 
the  Quantock  Hills,  in  the  same  county,  or  in  that  neigh- 
borhood ;  and,  at  length,  at  Alfoxton,  a  beautiful  country- 
house,  with  a  grove  and  shrubbery  attached,  belonging  to 
Mr.  St.  Aubyn,  a  minor,  and  let  (I  believe)  on  the  terms 
of  keeping  the  house  in  repair.  Whilst  resident  at  this 
last  place  it  was,  as  I  have  generally  understood,  and  in  the 
year  1797  or  1798,  that  Wordsworth  first  became  acquaint- 
ed with  Coleridge;  though,  possibly,  in  the  year  I  am 
wrong ;  for  it  occurs  to  me  that,  in  a  poem  published  in 
1796,  there  is  an  allusion  to  a  young  writer  of  the  name 
of  Wordsworth,  as  one  who  had  something  austere  in  his 
style,  but  otherwise  was  more  original  than  any  other  poet 
of  the  age  ;  and  it  is  probable  that  this,  and  knowledge  of 
the  poetry,  would  be  subsequent  to  a  personal  knowledge 
of  the  author,  considering  the  little  circulation  which  any 
poetry  of  a  Wordsworthian  stamp  would  be  likely  to 
attain  at  that  time. 

*  I  do  not,  on  consideration,  know  when  they  might  begin  to  keep 
ht.use  together;  but,  by  a  passage  in  *The  Prelude,'  they  must  have 
made  a  tour  together  as  early  as  1787. 


LITEBABT  BEMINISCENCES 


CHAPTER  XII. 

WILLIAM  WORDSWORTH. 


It  was  at  Alfoxton  that  Miss  Mary  Hutclimson  vi&ited 
her  cousins  the  Wordsworths  ;  and  there,  or  previously,  in 
the  North  of  England,  at  Stockton-upon-Tees  and  Darling- 
ton, that  the  attachment  began  between  Miss  Hutchinson 
and  Wordsworth,  which  terminated  in  their  marriage  about 
the  beginning  of  the  present  century.  The  marriage  took 
place  in  the  north  ;  somewhere,  I  believe,  in  Yorkshire ; 
and,  immediately  after  the  ceremony,  Wordsworth  brought 
his  bride  to  Grasmere  ;  in  which  most  lovely  of  English 
valleys  he  had  previously  obtained,  upon  a  lease  of  seven 
or  eight  years,  the  cottage  in  which  I  found  him  living  at 
my  first  visit  to  him  in  November,  1807.  I  have  heard 
that  there  was  a  paragraph  inserted  on  this  occasion  in  the 
Morning  Post  or  Courier  —  and  I  have  an  indistinct 
remembrance  of  having  once  seen  it  myself  —  which 
described  this  event  of  the  poet's  marriage  in  the  most 
ludicrous  terms  of  silly  pastoral  sentimentality  ;  the  cot- 
tage being  described  as  '  the  abode  of  content  and  all  the 
virtues,'  the  vale  itself  in  the  same  puerile  slang,  and  the 
whole  event  in  a  style  of  allegorical  trifling  about  the 
muses,  &c.  The  masculine  and  severe  taste  of  Words- 
wcith  made  him  peculiarly  open  to  annoyance  from  such 
absurd  trifling ;  and,  unless  his  sense  of  the  ludicrous 
overpowered  his  graver  feelings,  he  must  have  been  mucli 


WILLIAM  WORDSWORTH. 


345 


displeased  with  the  paragraph.  But,  after  all,  I  have 
understood  that  the  whole  affair  was  an  unseasonable  jest 
of  Coleridge's  or  Lamb's. 

To  us  who,  in  after  years,  were  Wordsworth's  friends, 
or  at  least  intimate  acquaintances  —  viz.  to  Professor 
Wilson  and  myself  —  the  most  interesting  circumstance 
in  this  marriage,  the  one  which  perplexed  us  exceedingly, 
was  the  very  possibility  that  it  should  ever  have  been 
brought  to  bear.  For  we  could  not  conceive  of  Words- 
worth as  submitting  his  faculties  to  the  humilities  and 
devotion  of  courtship.  That  self-surrender  —  that  pros- 
tration of  mind,  by  which  a  man  is  too  happy  and  proud 
to  express  the  profundity  of  his  service  to  the  woman  of 
his  heart  —  it  seemed  a  mere  impossibility  that  ever 
Wordsworth  should  be  brought  to  feel  for  a  single  instant ; 
and  what  he  did  not  sincerely  feel,  assuredly  he  was  not 
the  person  to  profess.  Ah,  happy,  happy  days !  —  in 
which,  for  a  young  man's  heart  that  is  deep  and  fervid  in 
his  affections,  and  passionate  in  his  admirations,  there  is 
but  one  presence  upon  earth,  one  glory,  one  heaven  of 
hope  !  —  days  how  fugitive,  how  incapable  of  return,  how 
imperishable  to  the  heart  of  all  that  a  man  has  lived  ! 
Wordsworth,  I  take  it  upon  myself  to  say,  had  not  the 
feelings  within  him  which  make  this  total  devotion  to  a 
woman  possible.  There  never  lived  the  woman  whom  he 
would  not  have  lectured  and  admonished  under  circum- 
stances that  should  have  seemed  to  require  it ;  nor  would 
he  have  conversed  with  her  in  any  mood  whatever  without 
wearing  an  air  of  mild  condescension  to  her  understanding. 
To  lie  at  her  feet,  to  make  her  his  idol,  to  worship  her 
very  caprices,  and  to  adore  the  most  unreasonable  of  her 
frowns  —  these  things  were  impossible  to  Wordsworth; 
and,  being  so,  never  could  he,  in  any  emphatic  sense,  have 
been  a  lover. 


346 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


A  lover,  therefore,  in  any  passionate  sense  of  the  word, 
Wordsworth  could  not  have  been.  And,  moreover,  it  is 
remarkable  that  a  woman  who  could  dispense  with  that 
Bort  of  homage  in  her  suitor,  is  not  of  a  nature  to  inspire 
such  a  passion.  That  same  meekness  which  reconciles 
her  to  the  tone  of  superiority  and  freedom  in  the  manner 
of  her  suitor,  and  which  may  afterwards  in  a  wife  become 
a  sweet  domestic  grace,  strips  her  of  that  too  charming 
irritation,  captivating  at  once  and  tormenting,  which  lurks 
in  feminine  pride.  If  there  be  an  enchantress's  spell  yet 
surviving  in  this  age  of  ours,  it  is  the  haughty  grace  of 
maidenly  pride  —  the  womanly  sense  of  dignity,  even 
when  most  in  excess,  and  expressed  in  the  language  of 
scorn  —  which  tortures  a  man  and  lacerates  his  heart,  at 
the  same  time  that  it  pierces  him  with  admiration. 

*  Oh,  what  a  world  of  scorn  looks  beautiful 
In  the  repelling  glances  of  her  eye ! ' 

And  she  who  spares  a  man  the  agitations  of  this  thral- 
dom, robs  him  no  less  of  its  divinest  transports.  Words- 
worth, however,  who  never  could  have  laid  aside  his  own 
nature  sufficiently  to  have  played  Ms  part  in  such  an 
impassioned  courtship,  by  suiting  himself  to  this  high 
sexual  pride  with  the  humility  of  a  lover  —  and,  perhaps, 
quite  as  little  have  enjoyed  the  spectacle  of  such  a  pride, 
or  have  viewed  it  in  any  degree  as  an  attraction  —  it  would 
to  him  have  been  a  pure  vexation.  Looking  down  even 
upon  the  lady  of  his  heart,  as  upon  the  rest  of  the  world, 
from  the  eminence  of  his  own  intellectual  superiority  — 
viewing  her,  in  fact,  as  a  child  —  he  would  be  much  moie 
disposed  to  regard  any  airs  of  feminine  disdain  she  might 
assume,  as  the  impertinence  of  girlish  levity,  than  as  the 
caprice  of  womanly  pride.  He  would  not,  indeed,  like 
Petruchio,  have  hinted  a  poss^'bility  that  he  might  be 


WILLIAM  WOBDSWOBTH.  31* 

provoked  to  box  her  ears  —  for  any  mode  of  unmanly 
roughness  would  have  seemed  abominable  to  his  nature, 
with  the  meanest  of  her  sex ;  but  much  I  fear  that,  in 
any  case  of  dispute,  he  would  have  called  even  his  mis- 
tress, '  Child !  child ! '  and  perhaps  even  (but  this  I  do 
not  say  with  the  same  certainty)  might  have  bid  her  hold 
tier  tongue.  Think  of  that,  reader,  with  such  lovers  as  I 
am  placing  in  ideal  contrast  with  these  !  —  image  to  your- 
self the  haughty  beauty,  and  the  majestic  wrath,  never  to 
be  propitiated  after  hearing  such  irreverent  language  — 
nay,  worse  than  irreverent  language  —  language  implying 
disenchantment !  Yet  still,  it  may  be  said,  can  a  man 
forget — absolutely  and  in  all  moments  forget  —  his  intel- 
lectual superiority  ?  You  yourself,  for  example,  who  write 
these  sketches,  did  it  follow  of  necessity  that  the  woman 
you  loved  should  be  equal  (or  seem  equal  in  your  own 
eyes)  to  yourself  in  intellect  ?  No ;  far  from  it.  I  could 
not,  perhaps,  have  loved,  with  a  perfect  love,  any  woman 
whom  I  had  felt  to  be  my  own  equal  intellectually ;  but 
then  I  never  thought  of  her  in  that  light,  or  under  that 
relation.  When  the  golden  gate  was  opened,  when  the 
gate  moved  upon  its  golden  hinges  that  opened  to  me 
the  paradise  of  her  society  —  when  her  young,  melodious 
laughter  sounded  in  my  too  agitated  ear  —  did  I  think  of 
any  claims  that  I  could  have  ?  Too  happy  if  I  might  be 
permitted  to  lay  all  things  at  her  feet,  all  things  that  I 
could  call  my  own,  or  ever  hope  to  do  so  —  yes,  though  it 
had  been  possible  that  by  power  divine  I  should  possess 
the  earth,  and  the  inheritance  of  the  earth, — 
*  The  sea,  and  all  which  they  contain.'  ♦ 
What  was  intellect,  what  was  power,  what  was  empire,  if 
I  had  happened  to  possess  them  all  in  excess?  Thew 


*  Paradise  Regained. 


348 


LITERABY  REMINISCENCES. 


things  were  not  of  the  nature  of,  had  no  common  nature 
with,  (lid  not  resemble,  were  no  approximation  to,  the 
sweet  angelic  power — power  infinite,  power  deathless, 
power  unutterable,  which  formed  her  virgin  dowry.  O 
heart,  why  art  thou  disquieted  ?  Tempestuous,  rebellious, 
heart !  oh,  wherefore  art  thou  still  dreaming  of  things  so 
long  gone  by,  of  expectations  that  could  not  be  fulfilled, 
that,  being  mortal,  must,  in  some  point,  have  a  mortal 
taint !  Empty,  emp^y  thoughts  !  vanity  of  vanities  !  Yet 
no  ;  not  always ;  for  sometimes,  after  days  of  intellectual 
toil,  when  half  the  whole  world  is  dreaming  —  I  wrap  my 
head  in  the  bed-clothes,  which  hide  even  the  faintest  mur- 
murs yet  lingering  from  the  fretful  day  — 

*  The  gaudy,  blabbing,  and  remorseful  day; ' 

and  then,  through  blinding  tears,  I  see  again  that  golden 
gate  ;  again  I  stand  waiting  at  the  entrance  ;  until  dreams 
come  that  carry  me  once  more  to  the  Paradise  beyond. 

If,  however,  no  lover,  in  a  proper  sense  —  though  from 
many  exquisite  passages  one  might  conceive  that  at  some 
time  of  his  life  he  was,  as  especially  from  the  inimitable 
stanzas  beginning — • 

*  When  she  I  loved  was  strong  and  gay. 
And  like  a  rose  in  June  ; ' 

or  perhaps  (but  less  powerfully  so,  because  here  the  pas- 
sion, though  profound,  is  less  the  peculiar  passion  of  love) 
from  the  impassioned  lamentation  for  *  the  pretty  Barbara,* 
beginning  — 

*  'Tis  said  that  some  have  died  for  love  : 
And  here  and  there,  amidst  unhallowed  ground 
In  the  cold  north,'  &c.  &c.  :  — 

yet,  if  no  lover,  or  (which  some  of  us  have  sometimes 
thought)  a  lover  disappointed  at  some  earlier  period,  by 


WILLIAM  WORDSWORTH. 


349 


the  death  of  her  he  loved,  or  by  some  other  fatal  cveni;, 
(for  he  always  preserved  a  mysterious  silence  on  the 
subject  of  that  '  Lucy/  repeatedly  alluded  to  or  apostro- 
phized in  his  poems,  and  I  have  heard,  from  gossiping 
people  about  Hawkshead,  some  snatches  of  tragical  story, 
which,  after  all,  might  be  an  idle  semi-fable,  improved 
out  of  slight  materials)  —  let  this  matter  have  been  as  it 
might  —  at  all  events  he  made,  what  for  him  turns  out, 
a  happy  marriage.  Few  people  have  lived  on  such 
terms  of  entire  harmony  and  affection  as  he  has  lived  with 
the  woman  of  his  final  choice.  Indeed,  the  sweetness, 
almost  unexampled,  of  temper,  which,  in  her  early  and 
middle  years,  shed  so  sunny  a  radiance  over  Mrs.  Words- 
worth's manners,  sustained  by  the  happy  life  she  led,  the 
purity  of  her  conscience,  and  the  uniformity  of  her  good 
health,  made  it  impossible  for  anybody  to  have  quarrelled 
with  her ;  and  whatever  fits  of  ill  temper  Wordsworth 
might  have  —  for,  with  all  his  philosophy,  he  had  such 
fits,  though  rarely  —  met  with  no  fuel  to  support  them, 
except  in  the  more  irritable  temperament  of  his  sister. 
She  was  all  fire,  and  an  ardor,  which,  like  that  of  the  first 
Lord  Shaftesbury, 

*  O'er-informed  its  tenement  of  clay; ' 

and,  as  this  ardor  looked  out  in  every  gleam  of  her  wild 
eyes,  (those  *  wild  eyes,'  so  finely  noticed  in  the  '  Tintern 
Abbey,')  as  it  spoke  in  every  word  of  her  self-bafiied 
utterance,  as  it  gave  a  trembling  movement  to  her  very 
person  and  demeanor  —  easily  enough  it  might  happen, 
that  any  apprehension  of  an  unkind  word  should  with  her 
kindle  a  dispute.  It  might  have  happened  ;  and  yet,  to 
the  great  honor  of  both,  having  such  impassioned  tem- 
peraments, rarely  it  did  happen  —  and  this  was  the  more 
••emarkable,  as  I  have  been  assured  that  both  were,  in 


850 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


childhood,  irritable,  or  even  ill-tempered  ;  and  they  were 
constantly  together  ;  for  Miss  Wordsworth  was  always 
ready  to  walk  out  —  wet  or  dry,  storm  or  sunshine,  night 
or  day  ;  whilst  Mrs.  Wordsworth  was  completely  dedicated 
to  her  maternal  duties,  and  rarely  left  the  house,  unless 
when  the  weather  was  tolerable,  or,  at  least,  only  for 
short  rambles.  I  should  not  have  noticed  this  trait  in 
Wordsworth's  occasional  manners,  had  it  been  gathered 
from  domestic  or  confidential  opportunities.  But,  on  the 
contrary,  the  first  two  occasions  on  which,  after  months' 
domestic  intercourse  with  Wordsworth,  I  first  became 
aware  of  his  possible  ill-humor  and  peevishness,  were  so 
public,  that  others,  and  those  strangers,  must  have  been 
equally  made  aware  of  the  scene. 

Having  brought  down  the  history  of  Wordsworth  to 
the  time  of  his  marriage,  I  am  reminded  by  that  event  to 
mention  the  singular  good  fortune,  in  all  points  of  worldly 
prosperity,  which  has  accompanied  him  through  life. 
His  marriage  —  the  capital  event  of  life  —  was  fortunate ; 
BO  were  all  the  minor  occasions  of  a  prosperous  life.  He 
has  himself  described,  in  his  •  Leech  Gatherer,'  the  fears 
that,  at  one  time,  or  at  least  in  some  occasional  moments 
of  his  life,  haunted  him,  lest  at  some  period  or  other  he 
might  be  reserved  for  poverty.  '  Cold,  pain,  and  hunger, 
and  all  fleshly  ills,'  occurred  to  his  boding  apprehension  — 

*  And  mighty  poets  in  their  misery  dead.* 

*  He  thought  of  Chatterton ,  the  marrellous  boy. 
The  sleepless  soul  that  perished  in  its  pride; 
Of  him  who  walked  in  glory  and  in  joy, 
Beside  his  plough  upon  the  mountain-side.' 

And,  at  starting  on  his  career  of  life,  certainly  no  man 
had  plainer  reasons  for  anticipating  the  worst  evils  tha* 
have  ever  persecuted  poets,  excepting  only  two  reasons 
Vhich  might  warrant  him  in  hopinoj  better  ;  and  those 


WILLIAM  WOBDSWOBTH. 


351 


cwo  were  —  his  great  prudence,  and  the  temperance  of 
his  daily  life.  He  could  not  be  betrayed  into  foolish 
engagements  ;  he  could  not  be  betrayed  into  expensive 
habits.  Profusion  and  extravagance  had  no  hold  over 
him,  by  any  one  passion  or  taste.  He  was  not  luxurious 
in  anything  ;  was  not  vain  or  even  careful  of  external 
appearances — (not  at  least  since  he  had  left  Cambridge, 
an.!  visited  a  mighty  nation  in  civil  convulsions  ;)  was 
not,  even  in  the  article  of  books,  expensive.  Very  few 
books  sufficed  him ;  he  was  carexcss  habitually  of  all  the 
current  literature,  or  indeed  of  any  literature  that  could 
not  be  considered  as  enshrining  the  very  ideal,  capital, 
and  elementary  grandeur  of  the  human  intellect.  It  will 
be  seen,  further  on,  that  in  this  extreme  limitation  of  his 
literary  sensibilities,  he  was  as  much  assisted  by  that 
accident  of  his  own  intellectual  condition,  which  the 
Germans  of  our  days  have  so  usefully  brought  forward  to 
the  consciousness,  and  by  which  so  many  anomalies  of 
opinion  are  solved  —  viz.  his  extreme,  intense,  unparal- 
leled onesidedness,  {einseiligkeit,)  as  by  any  peculiar 
sanity  of  feeling.  Thousands  of  books,  that  have  given 
the  most  genuine  and  even  rapturous  delight  to  millions  of 
ingenuous  minds,  for  Wordsworth  were  absolutely  a  dead 
letter  —  closed  and  sealed  up  from  his  sensibilities  and 
his  powers  of  appreciation,  not  less  than  colors  from  a 
blind  man's  eye.  Even  the  few  books  which  his  peculiar 
mind  had  made  indispensable  to  him,  were  not  so  in  the 
degree  which  they  would  have  been  to  a  man  of  more 
sedentary  habits.  He  lived  in  the  open  air;  and  the 
enormity  of  pleasure  which  both  he  and  his  sister  drew 
from  the  common  appearances  of  nature  and  their  ever- 
lasting variety —  variety  so  infinite,  that  if  no  one  leaf  of 
a  tree,  or  shrub,  according  to  I-eibnitz's  principle,  ever 
exactly  resembled  another  in  all  its  filaments,  and  their 


352 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


an*angement,  still  less  did  any  one  day  ever  repea 
another  in  all  its  pleasurable  elements  —  this  pleasure 
was  to  him,  in  the  stead  of  many  libraries  — 

*  One  impulse  from  a  vernal  wood. 
Could  teach  him  more  of  Man, 
Of  moral  evil,  and  of  good. 
Than  all  the  sages  can.* 

And  he,  we  may  be  sure,  who  could  draw 

— *  even  from  the  meanest  flower  that  blows. 
Thoughts  that  do  often  lie  too  deep  for  tears; ' 

to  whom  the  mere  daisy,  the  pansy,  the  primrose,  could 
furnish  pleasures  —  not  the  puerile  ones  which  his  most 
puerile  and  worldly  insulters  imagined,  but  pleasures 
drawn  from  depths  of  reverie  and  meditative  tenderness 
far  beyond  all  power  of  their  hearts  to  conceive :  —  that 
man  would  hardly  need  any  large  variety  of  books.  In 
fact,  there  were  only  two  provinces  of  literature  in  which 
Wordsworth  could  be  looked  upon  as  well  read  —  Poetry 
and  Ancient  History.  Nor  do  I  believe  that  he  would 
much  have  lamented,  on  his  own  account,  if  all  books 
had  perished,  excepting  the  entire  body  of  English  poetry, 
and,  perhaps,  '  Plutarch's  Lives.' 

With  these  simple  or  rather  austere  tastes,  Wordsworth 
(it  might  seem)  had  little  reason  to  fear  poverty  —  cer- 
tainly not  with  any  moderate  income  ;  but  meantime  he 
had  none.  About  the  time  when  he  left  college,  I  have 
good  grounds  for  believing  that  his  whole  regular  income 
was  precisely  =  0.    Some  fragments  must  have  survived 

*  T  do  not  mean  to  insinuate  that  Wordsworth  was  at  all  in  the 
dark  about  the  inaccuracy  and  want  of  authentic  weight  attaching 
to  Plutarch  as  an  historian;  but  his  business  with  Plutarch  was  not 
©r  purposes  of  research  :  he  was  satisfied  with  his  fine  moral  effects- 


WILLIAM  WORDSWORTH. 


353 


from  the  funds  devoted  to  his  education  ;  and  with  these, 
ao  doubt,  he  supported  the  expenses  of  his  continental 
tours,  and  his  year's  residence  in  France.  But,  at  length, 
cold,  pain,  and  hunger,  and  ^  all  fleshly  ills,'  must  have 
stared  him  in  the  face  pretty  earnestly.  And  hope  of 
longer  evading  an  unpleasant  destiny  of  daily  toil  in  some 
form  or  other  there  seemed  absolutely  none. 

'  For,'  as  he  himself  expostulates  with  himself  — 

*  For  how  can  he  expect  that  others  should 
Sow  for  him,  build  for  /im,  and,  at  his  call. 
Love  him,  who  for  himself  will  take  no  thought  at  all  ?  * 

In  this  dilemma  he  had  all  but  resolved,  as  Miss  Words- 
worth once  told  me,  to  take  pupils  ;  and  perhaps  thaty 
though  odious  enough,  was  the  sole  resource  he  had  ;  for, 
with  all  his  immeasurable  genius,  Wordsworth  has  not, 
even  yet,  and  from  long  experience,  acquired  any  popular 
talent  of  writing  for  the  current  press ;  and,  at  that  period 
of  his  life,  he  was  gloomily  unfitted  for  bending  to  such  a 
yoke.  In  this  crisis  of  his  fate,  possibly  it  might  be  —  a 
fact  which  a  mere  accident  once  caused  Miss  Wordsworth 
to  mention  to  me,  in  a  whispering  tone,  and  (as  if  ashamed 
of  it)  she  never  recurred  to  it  —  that  Wordsworth,  for 
once,  and  once  only,  became  a  martyr  to  some  nervous 
affection.  That  raised  pity  ;  but  I  could  not  forbear 
smiling  at  the  remedy,  or  palliation,  which  his  few  friends 
adopted.  Every  night  they  played  at  cards  with  him,  as 
the  best  mode  of  beguiling  his  sense  of  distress,  whatever 
it  might  be  ;  cards,  which,  in  any  part  of  the  thirty-and- 
one  years  since  I  have  known  Wordsworth,  could  have 
had  as  little  power  to  interest  him,  or  to  cheat  him  of 
Borrow,  as  marbles  or  a  kite  —  (^Scotice,  a  dragon !) 
However,  so  it  was  ;  for  my  information  could  not  be 
questioned:  it  came  from  Miss  Wordsworth. 

The  crisis,  as  1  have  said,  had  arrived  for  determining 
23 


354 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


the  future  color  of  his  life.  Memorable  it  is,  that  exactly 
In  those  critical  moments  wnen  some  decisive  step  had 
first  become  necessary,  there  happened  the  first  instance 
of  Wordsworth's  good  luck ;  and  equally  memorable  that, 
at  measured  intervals,  throughout  the  long  sequel  of  his 
life  since  then,  a  regular  succession  of  similar  but  superior 
God-sends  have  fallen  in,  to  sustain  his  expenditure,  duly 
as  it  grew  with  the  growing  claims  upon  his  purse.  A 
more  tortunate  man,  I  believe,  does  not  exist  than  Words- 
worth. The  aid  which  now  dropped  from  heaven,  as  it 
were,  to  enable  him  to  range  at  will  in  paths  of  his  own 
choosing,  and 

•  Finally  array 
His  temples  with  the  muses'  diadem,' 

came  in  the  shape  of  a  bequest  from  Raisley  Calvert,  a 
young  man  of  good  family  in  Cumberland,  who  died 
about  this  time  of  pulmonary  consumption.  A  very 
remarkable  young  man  he  must  have  been,  this  Raisley 
Calvert,  to  have  discerned,  at  this  early  period,  that 
future  superiority  in  Wordsworth  which  so  few  people 
suspected.  He  was  the  brother  of  a  Cumberland  gentle- 
man, whom  I  have  seen ;  a  generous  man,  doubtless  ;  for 
he  made  no  sort  of  objections  (though  legally,  I  have 
heard,  he  might)  to  his  brother's  farewell  memorial  of 
regard  ;  a  good  man  to  all  his  dependents,  as  I  have 
generally  understood,  in  the  neighborhood  of  Windy 
Brow,  his  mansion,  near  Keswick ;  and,  as  Southey 
always  said,  (who  must  know  better  than  I  could  do,)  a 
man  of  strong  natural  endowments  ;  else,  as  his  talk  was 
of  oxen,  I  might  have  made  the  mistake  of  supposing  him 
to  be,  in  heart  and  soul,  what  he  was  in  profession  —  a 
mere  farming  country  gentleman,  whose  ambition  was 
tiiiefly  planted  upon  turning  up  mighty  turnips.  The 


WILLIAM  WCRLSWORTH. 


355 


sum  left  by  Kaisley  Calvert  was  £900 ;  and  it  was  laid 
out  in  an  annuity.  This  was  the  basis  of  Wordsworth's 
prosperity  in  life ;  and  upon  this  he  has  built  up,  by  a 
series  of  accessions,  in  which  each  step,  taken  separately 
for  itself,  seems  perfectly  natural,  whilst  the  total  result 
has  undoubtedly  something  wonderful  about  it,  the  pres- 
ent goodly  edifice  of  his  fortunes.  Next  in  the  series, 
came  the  present  Lord  Lonsdale's  repayment  of  his  pre- 
decessor's debt.  Upon  that,  probably,  it  was  that  Words- 
worth felt  himself  entitled  to  marry.  Then,  I  believe, 
came  some  fortune  with  Miss  Hutchinson  ;  then  —  that  is, 
fourthly  —  some  worthy  uncle  of  the  same  lady  was 
pleased  to  betake  himself  to  a  better  world,  leaving  to 
various  nieces,  and  especially  to  Mrs.  Wordsworth, 
something  or  other  —  I  forget  what,  but  it  was  expressed 
by  thousands  of  pounds.  At  this  moment,  Wordsworth's 
family  had  begun  to  increase  ;  and  the  worthy  old  uncle, 
like  everybody  else  in  Wordsworth's  case,  (I  wish  I  could 
say  the  same  in  my  own,)  finding  his  property  very  clearly 
*  wanted,'  and,  as  people  would  tell  him,  '  bespoke,'  felt 
how  very  indelicate  it  would  look  foi  him  to  stay  any 
longer  ;  and  so  off  he  moved.  But  Wordsworth's  family, 
and  the  wants  of  that  family,  still  continued  to  increase  ; 
and  the  next  person  —  viz.  the  fifth  —  who  stood  in  the 
way,  and  must,  therefore,  have  considered  himself  rapidly 
growing  into  a  nuisance,  was  the  Stamp-Distributor  for 
the  county  of  Westmoreland.  About  March,  1814,  I 
think  it  was,  that  his  very  comfortable  situation  was 
granted.  Probably  it  took  a  month  for  the  news  to  reach 
him  ;  because  in  April,  and  not  before,  feeling  that  he  had 
received  a  proper  notice  to  quit,  he,  good  man,  this  stamp- 
distributor,  like  all  the  rest,  distributed  himself  and  his 
office  into  two  different  places  —  the  ^atter  falling,  of 
course,  into  the  hands  of  Wordsworth. 


356 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


This  office,  which  it  was  Wordsworth's  pleasure  to 
speak  of  as  'a  little  one,'  yielded,  I  believe,  somewhere 
about  £500  a  year.  Gradually,  even  that^  with  all 
former  sources  of  income,  became  insufficient,  which 
ought  not  to  surprise  anybody  ;  for  a  son  at  Oxford,  as  a 
gentleman  commoner,  would  spend,  at  the  least,  £300 
per  annum  ;  and  there  were  other  children.  Still  it  is 
wrong  to  say  that  it  had  become  insufficient ;  as  usual,  it 
had  not  come  to  that ;  but,  on  the  first  symptoms  aTising 
that  it  would  soon  come  to  that,  somebody,  of  course, 
had  notice  to  consider  himself  a  sort  of  nuisance  elect  — 
in  this  case,  it  was  the  distributor  of  stamps  for  the 
county  of  Cumberland.  His  district  was  absurdly  large  ; 
and  what  so  reasonable  as  that  he  should  submit  to  a 
Polish  partition  of  his  profits  —  no,  not  Polish  ;  for,  on 
reflection,  such  a  partition  neither  was  nor  could  be 
attempted  with  regard  to  an  actual  incumbent.  But  then, 
since  people  had  such  consideration  for  him  as  not  to 
remodel  the  office  so  long  as  he  lived,  on  the  other  hand, 
the  least  he  could  do  for  '  people '  in  return,  so  as  to  show 
his  sense  of  this  consideration,  was  not  to  trespass  on  so 
much  goodness  longer  than  necessary.  Accordingly, 
here,  as  in  all  cases  before,  the  DeMS  ex  machind  who 
invaiiably  interfered  when  any  nodus  arose  in  Words- 
worth's afiairs,  such  as  could  be  considered  vindice 
dignus,  caused  the  distributor  to  begone  into  a  region 
where  no  stamps  are  wanted,  about  the  very  month,  or 
BO,  when  an  additional  £400  per  annum  became  desira- 
ble. This,  or  perhaps  more,  was  understood  to  have 
been  added  by  the  new  arrangement,  to  the  Westmore- 
land distributorship  :  the  small  towns  of  Keswick  and 
Cockermouth,  together  with  the  important  one  of  White- 
haven, being  severed,  under  this  regulation,  from  their 
old  dependency,  or  Cumberland,  (to  which  geographically 


WILLIAM  WOKDSWORTH. 


357 


they  belonged,)  and  transferred  to  the  small  territory  of 
rocky  Westmoreland,  the  sum  total  of  whose  inhabitants 
was,  at  that  time,  not  much  above  50,000 ;  of  which  num- 
ber, one  third,  or  nearly  so,  might  be  collected  into  the 
only  important  town  of  Kendal ;  but,  of  the  other  two 
thirds,  a  larger  proportion  was  a  simple  agricultural  or 
pastoral  population,  than  anywhere  else  in  England.  In 
Westmoreland,  therefore,  it  may  be  supposed  that  the 
stamp  aemand  could  not  have  been  so  great,  not,  perhaps, 
by  three  quarters,  as  in  Cumberland ;  which,  besides 
having  a  population  of  160,000,  had  more  and  larger 
towns.  The  result  of  this  new  distribution,  was  some- 
thing that  approached  to  an  equalization  of  the  districts 
—  giving  to  each,  as  was  said  in  round  terms,  a  thousand 
a  year  ;  but,  in  more  accurate  terms,  perhaps  £900. 

Thus  I  have  traced  Wordsworth's  ascent  through  its 
several  steps  and  stages,  to  what,  for  his  moderate  desires 
and  habits  so  philosophic,  may  be  fairly  considered  opu- 
lence. And  it  must  rejoice  every  man,  who  joins  in  the 
public  homage  now  rendered  to  his  powers,  (and  what 
man  is  to  be  found  that  more  or  less  does  not?)  to  hear, 
with  respect  to  one  so  lavishly  endowed  by  nature,  that 
he  has  not  been  neglected  by  fortune ;  that  he  has  never 
had  the  finer  edge  of  his  sensibilities  dulled  by  the  sad 
anxieties,  the  degrading  fears,  the  miserable  dependencies 
of  debt ;  that  he  has  been  blessed  with  competency  even 
when  poorest;  has  had  hope  and  cheerful  prospects  in 
reversion,  through  every  stage  of  his  life ;  that  at  all  times 
he  has  been  liberated  from  reasonable  anxieties  about  the 
final  interests  of  his  children;  that  at  all  times  he  has 
been  blessed  with  leisure,  the  very  amplest  that  ever  man 
'jnjoyed,  for  in*:ellectual  pursuits  the  most  delightful;  yes, 
that  even  for  those  delicate  and  coy  pursuits,  he  has 
possessed,  in  combination,  all  the  conditions  for  thek 


358 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


most  perfect,  culture  —  the  leisure,  the  ease,  the  solitude, 
the  society,  the  domestic  peace,  the  local  scenery  —  Para- 
dise for  hie  eye,  in  Miltonic  beauty,  lying  outside  his 
windows,  Paradise  for  his  heart,  in  the  perpetual  happiness 
of  his  own,  fireside ;  and,  finally,  when  increasing  years 
might  be  supposed  to  demand  something  more  of  modern 
luxuries,  and  expanding  intercourse  with  society  in  its 
most  polished  forms,  something  more  of  refined  elegances, 
that  his  means,  still  keeping  pace,  in  almost  arithmetical 
ratio,  with  his  wants,  had  shed  the  graces  of  art  upon  the 
failing  powers  of  nature,  had  stripped  infirmity  of  discom- 
fort, and  (so  far  as  the  necessities  of  things  will  allow) 
had  placed  the  final  stages  of  life,  by  means  of  many  com- 
pensations, by  universal  praise,  by  plaudits  reverberated 
from  senates,  benedictions  wherever  his  poems  have 
penetrated,  honor,  troops  of  friends  —  in  short,  by  all  that 
miraculous  prosperity  can  do  to  evade  the  primal  decrees 
of  nature  —  had  placed  the  final  stages  upon  a  level  with 
the  first.  This  report  of  Wordsworth's  success  in  life 
will  rejoice  thousands  of  hearts.  And  a  good  nature  will 
sympathize  with  that  joy,  will  exult  in  that  exultation,  no 
matter  for  any  private  grievances,  and  with  a  non  obstante 
to  any  wrong,  however  stinging,  which  it  may  suppose 
itself  to  have  suffered.  Yet,  William  Wordsworth,  never- 
theless, if  you  ever  allowed  yourself  to  forget  the  human 
tenure  of  these  migiity  blessings  —  if,  though  wearing 
your  honors  justly  —  most  justly,  as  respects  A.  and  B., 
this  man  and  that  man  —  you  have  forgotten  that  no  man 
can  challenge  such  trophies  by  any  absolute  or  meritori- 
ous title,  as  respects  the  dark  powers  which  give  and  take 
away  —  if,  in  the  blind  spirit  of  presumption,  you  have 
insulted  the  less  prosperous  fortunes  of  a  brother,  frail, 
indeed,  but  not  disnonorably  frail,  and  in  his  very  frailty 
—  that  is,  in  hi?  failing  exertions  —  and  for  the  deficient 


WILLIAM  "WORDSWORTH. 


359 


measure  of  his  energies,  (doubtless  too  mivih  below  the 
standard  of  reasonable  expectations,)  able  to  plead  that 
which  you  never  cared  to  ask  —  then,  if  (instead  of  being 
sixty-eight  years  old)  you  were  I  should  warn  you  to 
listen  for  the  steps  of  Nemesis  approaching  from  afar ; 
and,  were  it  only  in  relation  to  your  own  extremity  of 
good  fortune,  I  would  say,  in  the  case  of  your  being  a 
young  man,  lavish  as  she  may  have  been  hitherto,  and  for 
years  to  come  may  still  be  — 

•  Yet  fear  her,  0  thou  miuion  of  her  pleasure  ! 
Her  audit,  though  delay 'd,  answered  must  be. 
And  her  quietus  is  to  render  thee.'  * 

But  now,  reverting  to  the  subject  of  Wordsworth's 
prosperity,  I  have  numbered  up  six  separate  stages  of 
good  luck  —  six  instances  of  pecuniary  showers  emptying 
themselves  into  his  very  bosom,  at  the  very  moments 
when  they  began  to  be  needed,  on  the  first  symptoms  that 
they  might  be  wanted  —  accesses  of  fortune  stationed, 
upon  his'  road,  like  repeating  frigates,  connecting,  to  all 
appearance  some  preconcerted  line  of  operations;  and, 
amidst  the  tumults  of  chance,  wearing  as  much  the  air  of 
purpose  and  design,  as  if  they  supported  a  human  plan  — 
so  much  the  more,  also,  to  a  thoughtful  observer,  as  the 
subject  of  this  overflowing  favor  from  the  blind  goddess, 
happened,  by  the  rarest  of  accidents,  to  be  that  man 
whom  many  of  us  would  have  declared  the  most  worthy 
of  that  favor,  most  of  us,  perhaps,  as  in  the  case  of 
Themistocles,  would  have  declared,  at  the  very  leasts 
second  best.  1  have  come  down  to  the  sixth  case. 
Whether  there  were  any  seventh,  I  do  not  know :  but 
confident  I  feel,  that,  had  a  seventh  been  required  by 
circumstances,  a  seventn  would  have  happened.    At  the 


♦  Shakspeare's  Sonnets. 


360 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


same  time,  every  reader  will,  of  .course,  understand  me 
to  mean,  that  not  only  was  it  utterly  out  of  the  power  or 
will  of  Wordsworth  to  exert  any,  the  very  slightest  influ- 
ence upon  these  cases,  not  only  was  this  impossible — not 
only  was  it  impossible  to  the  moral  nature  of  Wordsworth, 
that  he  should  even  express  that  sort  of  interest  in  the 
event,  which  is  sometimes  intimated  to  the  incumbents  of 
a  place  or  church-living  by  sudden  inquiries  after  their 
health  from  eager  expectants  —  but  also,  in  every  one  of 
the  instances  recorded,  he  could  have  had  not  the  slightest 
knowledge  beforehand  of  any  interest  at  issue  for  him- 
self. This  explanation  I  make  to  forestall  the  merest 
possibility  of  misapprehension.  And  yet,  for  all  that,  so 
true  it  is,  that  still,  as  Wordsworth  needed  a  place  or  a 
fortune,  the  holder  of  that  place  or  fortune  was  imme- 
diately served  with  a  summons  to  surrender  it  —  so 
certainly  was  this  impressed  upon  my  belief,  as  one  of 
the  blind  necessities,  making  up  the  prosperity  and  fixed 
destiny  of  Wordsworth,  that,  for  myself  —  had  I  happened 
to  know  of  any  peculiar  adaptation  in  an  estate  or  office  of 
mine,  to  an  existing  need  of  Wordsworth's  —  forthwith, 
and  with  the  speed  of  a  man  running  for  his  life,  I  would 
have  laid  it  down  at  his  feet.  '  Take  it,'  I  would  have 
said  —  'take  it  —  or  in  three  weeks  I  shall  be  a  dead 
man.' 

Well  —  let  me  pause :  I  think  the  reader  is  likely,  by 
this  time,  to  have  a  slight  notion  of  my  notion  of  Words- 
worth's inevitable  prosperity  —  and  the  sort  of  lien  that  he 
had  upon  the  incomes  of  other  men  who  happened  to  stand 
in  his  way.  The  same  prosperity  attended  the  other 
branches  of  the  family,  with  the  single  exception  of  John, 
the  brother  who  perished  in  the  Abergavenny  :  and  even 
be  was  prosperous  up  to  the  moment  of  his  fatal  accident. 
A-s  to  Miss  Wordsworth,  who  will,  by  some  people,  be 


WILLIAM  WOBDSWORTH 


361 


clas&ed  amongst  the  non-prosperous,  I  rank  her  amongst 
the  most  fortunate  of  women  ;  or,  at  least,  if  regard  be 
had  to  that  period  of  life  which  is  most  capable  of  happi- 
ness. Her  fortune,  after  its  repayment  by  Lord  Lonsdale, 
was,  much  of  it,  confided  with  a  sisterly  affection,  to  the 
use  of  her  brother  John  ;  and  most  of  it  perished  in  his 
ship.  How  much  I  never  felt  myself  entitled  to  ask  ;  but 
certainly  a  part  was  on  that  occasion  lost  irretrievably. 
Either  it  was  that  only  a  partial  insurance  had  been 
effected,  or  else  the  nature  of  the  accident,  being  in  home 
waters,  (off  the  coast  of  Dorsetshire,)  might,  by  the  nature 
of  the  contract,  have  taken  the  case  out  of  the  benefit  of 
the  policy.  The  loss,  however,  had  it  even  been  total,  for 
a  single  sister  amongst  a  family  of  flourishing  brothers, 
could  not  be  of  any  lasting  importance.  A  much  larger 
number  of  voices  would  proclaim  her  to  have  been  unfor- 
tunate in  life,  because  she  made  no  marriage  connection ; 
and  certainly  the  insipid  as  well  as  unfeeling  ridicule 
which  descends  so  plentifully  from  vulgar  minds,  upon 
those  women  who,  perhaps  from  strength  of  character, 
have  refused  to  make  such  a  connection  where  it  promised 
little  of  elevated  happiness,  does  make  the  state  of  single- 
ness somewhat  of  a  trial  to  the  patience  of  many  ;  and  to 
many  the  cruelty  of  this  trial  has  proved  a  snare  for 
beguiling  them  of  their  honorable  resolutions.  Doubtless 
the  most  elevated  form,  and  the  most  impassioned,  of 
human  happiness,  cannot  be  had  out  of  marriage.  But, 
as  the  opportunities  are  rare  in  which  all  the  conditions 
concur  for  such  connections,  how  important  it  is  that  the 
dignity  of  noble-minded  (and,  in  the  lowest  case,  of  firm- 
minded)  women,  should  be  upheld  by  society  in  the  hon- 
orable election  they  make  of  a  self-dependent  state  of 
virgin  seclusion,  by  preference  to  a  heartless  marriage ! 
Such  women,  as  Mrs.  Trollope  justly  remarks,  fill  a  place 


362 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


in  society  which,  in  their  default,  could  not  be  supplied, 
and  are  disposable  for  duties  requiring  a  tenderness  and  a 
punctuality  that  could  not  be  hoped  from  women  pre- 
occupied with  household  or  maternal  claims.  In  anothei 
point,  Mrs.  Trollope  is  right :  few  women  live  unmarried 
from  necessity  —  few  indeed.  Miss  Wordsworth,  to  mj/ 
knowledge,  had  several  offers  —  amongst  them,  one  from 
Hazlitt ;  all,  without  a  moment's  hesitation,  she  rejected 
decisively.  And  she  did  right.  A  happier  life,  by  far, 
was  hers  in  youth,  coming  as  near  as  difference  of  scenery 
and  difference  of  relations  would  permit,  to  that  which  was 
promised  to  Ruth  —  the  Ruth  of  her  brother's^*  creation  — 
by  the  youth  who  came  from  Georgia's  shore  ;  for,  though 
not  upon  American  savannas,  or  Canadian  lakes  — 

*  With  all  their  fairy  crowds 
Of  islands,  that  together  lie 
As  quietly  as  spots  of  sky 

Amongst  the  evening  clouds  '  — 

yet,  amongst  the  loveliest  scenes  of  sylvan  England,  and 
(at  intervals)  of  sylvan  Germany  —  amongst  lakes,  too, 
far  better  fitted  to  give  the  sense  of  their  own  character 
than  the  inland  seas  of  America,  and  amongst  mountains 
as  romantic  and  loftier  than  many  of  the  chief  ranges  in 
that  country  —  her  time  fleeted  away  like  some  golden 

♦  •  The  Ruth  of  her  b^^other^s  creation  :  "  —  so  I  express  it,  be- 
cause so  much  in  the  development  of  the  story  and  situations  necessa* 
rily  belongs  to  the  poet.  Else,  for  the  mere  outline  of  the  story,  it 
was  founded  upon  fact :  Wordsworth  himself  told  me,  in  general 
terms,  that  the  case  which  suggested  the  poem  was  that  of  an  Amer 
ican  lady,  whose  husband  forsook  her  at  the  very  place  of  embarka- 
tion from  England,  under  circumstances  and  under  expectations 
upon  her  part ,  very  much  the  same  as  those  of  Ruth,  I  am  atr^id 
however,  that  the  husband  was  an  attorney 


WILLIAM  WOKDSWORTH. 


363 


age,  or  like  the  life  of  primeval  man  ;  and  she,  like  Iluth, 
ivas  for  years  allowed 

*  To  run,  though  not  a  bride, 
A  sylvan  huntress.,  by  the  side  ' 

01  him  to  whom,  like  Ruth,  she  had  dedicated  her  days ; 
and  to  whose  children,  afterwards,  she  dedicated  a  love 
like  that  of  mothers.  Dear  Miss  Wordsworth !  How 
noble  a  creature  did  she  seem  when  I  first  knew  her  !  — 
and  when,  on  the  very  first  night  which  I  passed  in  her 
brother's  company,  he  read  to  me,  in  illustration  of  some- 
thing he  was  saying,  a  passege  from  Fairfax's  Tasso, 
ending  pretty  nearly  with  these  words  — 

•  Amidst  the  broad  fields  and  the  endless  wood 
The  lofty  lady  kept  her  maidenhood  '  — 

I  thought  that,  possibly,  he  had  his  sister  in  his  thoughts: 
Yet  '  lofty '  was  hardly  the  right  word.  Miss  Wordsworth 
was  too  ardent  and  fiery  a  creature  to  maintain  the  reserve 
essential  to  dignity  ;  and  dignity  was  the  last  thing  one 
thought  of  in  the  presence  of  one  so  artless,  so  fervent  in 
her  feelings,  and  so  embarrassed  in  their  utterance  — 
sometimes,  also,  in  the  attempt  to  check  them.  It  must 
not,  however,  be  supposed  that  there  was  any  silliness  or 
tveakness  of  enthusiasm  about  her.  She  was  under  the 
t\)ntinual  restraint  of  severe  good  sense,  though  liberated 
from  that  false  shame  which,  in  so  many  persons,  accom- 
panies all  expressions  of  natural  emotion  ;  and  she  had  too 
long  enjoyed  the  ennobling  conversation  of  her  brother, 
and  his  admirable  comments  on  the  daily  reading  which 
they  pursued  in  common,  to  fail  in  any  essential  point  of 
ogic  or  propriety  of  thought.  Accordingly,  her  letters, 
*-hough  the  most  careless  and  unelaborate  —  nay,  the  most 
huriied  that  can  be  imagined  —  are  models  of  good  sense 
%nd  just  feeling.    In  short   beyond  aTiy  person  I  have 


S64 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


known  in  this  world,  Miss  Wordsworth  was  the  creature  of 
impulse  ;  but,  as  a  woman  most  thoroughly  virtuous  and 
well-principled,  as  one  who  could  not  fail  to  be  kept  right 
by  her  own  excellent  heart,  and  as  an  intellectual  creature 
from  her  cradle,  with  much  of  her  illustrious  brother's 
peculiarity  of  mind  —  finally,  as  one  who  had  been,  in 
effect,  educated  and  trained  by  that  very  brother  —  she 
won  the  sympathy  and  the  respectful  regard  of  every  man 
worthy  to  approach  her.  All  of  us  loved  her  —  by  which 
us  I  mean  especially  Professor  Wilson  and  myself,  together 
with  such  Oxford  or  Cambridge  men,  or  men  from  Scot- 
land, as  either  of  us  or  as  others  introduced -to  her  society. 
And  many  a  time,  when  the  Professor  and  myself  — 
travelling  together  in  solitary  places,  sleeping  in  the  same 
bedroom,  or  (according  to  accidents  of  wayfaring  life)  in 
the  same  bed  —  have  fallen  into  the  most  confidential 
interchange  of  opinions  upon  a  family  in  which  we  had 
both  so  common  and  so  profound  an  interest,  whatever 
matter  of  anger  or  complaint  we  might  find  or  fancy  in 
others.  Miss  Wordsworth's  was  a  name  privileged  from 
censure  ;  or,  if  a  smile  were  bestowed  upon  some  eccen- 
tricity or  innocent  foiblCj  it  was  with  the  tenderness  that 
we  should  have  shown  to  a  sister.  Properly,  and  in  a 
spirit  of  prophecy,  was  she  named  Dorothy  ;  for,  as  that 
name  apparently  predestines  her  who  bears  it  to  figure 
rather  in  the  character  of  aunt  than  of  mother,  (insomuch, 
that  I  have  rarely  happened  to  hear  this  name,  except, 
indeed,  in  Germany,  without  the  prefix  of  aunt,)  so,  also, 
n  its  Greek  meaning,*'  gift  of  God,  well  did  this  name 

♦  Of  course,  therefore,  it  is  essentially  the  sam^  name  as  Theo* 
dor  a  —  the  same  elements  being  only  differently  arranged.  Yet  how 
opposite  is  the  impression  upon  the  mind  !  and  chiefly,  I  suppose, 
^om  the  too  prominent  clfect  of  this  name  in  the  case  of  Justinian's 
rtcandalous  wife. 


WILLIAM  WORDSWORTH. 


365 


prefigure  tlie  relation  in  wHcli  she  stood  to  Wordsworth, 
the  mission  with  which  she  was  charged  —  to  wait  upon 
him  as  the  tenderest  and  most  faithful  of  domestics  ;  to 
love  him  as  a  sister  :  to  sympathize  with  him  as  a  confi- 
dante ;  to  counsel  him  as  one  gifted  with  a  power  of 
judging  that  stretched  as  far  as  his  own  for  producing  ;  to 
cheer  him  and  sustain  him  by  the  natural  expression  of  her 
feelings  —  so  quick,  so  ardent,  so  unafiected  —  upon  the 
probable  effect  of  whatever  thoughts,  plans,  images  he 
might  conceive  ;  finally,  and  above  all  other  ministrations, 
to  ingraft,  by  her  sexual  sense  of  beauty,  upon  his  mas- 
culine austerity  that  delicacy  and  those  graces,  which  else 
(accordirg  to  the  grateful  acknowledgments  of  his  own 
maturest  retrospect)  it  would  not  have  had. 

*  The  blessing  of  my  later  years 

Was  with  me  when  I  was  a  boy  : 
She  gave  me  hopes,  she  gave  me  fears, 
A  heart  the  fountain  of  sweet  tears. 

And  love,  and  thought,  and  joy.' 
And  elsewhere  he  describes  her,  in  a  philosophic  poem, 
still  in  MS.,  as  one  who  planted  flowers  and  blossoms  with 
her  feminine  hand  upon  what  might  else  have  been  an 
arid  rock  —  massy,  indeed,  and  grand,  but  repulsive  from 
the  severity  of  its  features.  I  may  sum  up  in  one  brief 
abstract  the  sum  total  of  Miss  Wordsworth's  character,  as 
a  companion,  by  saying,  that  she  was  the  very  wildest  (in 
the  sense  of  the  most  natural)  person  I  have  ever  known ; 
and  also  the  truest,  most  inevitable,  and,  at  the  same  time, 
the  quickest  and  readiest  in  her  sympathy  with  either  joy 
or  sorrow,  with  laughter  or  with  tears,  with  the  realities 
of  life  or  the  larger  realities  of  the  poets ! 

Meantime,  amidst  all  this  fascinating  furniture  of  her 
mind,  won  fron  nature,  frcm  solitude,  from  enlightened 
companionship.  Miss  Wordsworth  was  thoroughly  defi- 


866 


LITEKARY  REMINISCENCES. 


cient  (some  would  say  painfully  deficient  —  T  say  diarm-" 
ingly  deficient)  in  ordinary  female  accomplishments,  aa 
*  Cousin  Mary/  in  Miss  Mitford's  delightful  sketch. 
French,  she  might  have  barely  enough  to  read  a  plain 
modern  page  of  narrative  ;  Italian,  I  question  whether 
any  ;  German,  just  enough  to  insult  the  German  literati, 
by  showing  how  little  she  had  found  them  or  their  writings 
necessary  to  her  heart.  The  '  Luise  '  of  Voss,  the  *  Her- 
mann and  Dorothea'  of  Goethe,  she  had  begun  to  trans- 
late, as  young  ladies  do  '  Telemaque  ; '  but,  li^e  them, 
had  chiefly  cultivated  the  first  two  pages  ;  ^'  with  the  third, 
she  had  a  slender  acquaintance,  and  with  Ihe  fourth,  she 
meditated  an  intimacy  at  some  future  day.  Music,  in  her 
solitary  and  out-of-doors  life,  she  could  have  little  reason 
for  cultivating  ;  nor  is  it  possible  that  any  woman  can 
draw  the  enormous  energy  requisite  for  this  attainment 
upon  a  modern  scale  of  perfection,  out  of  any  other  prin- 
ciple, than  that  of  vanity  (at  least  of  great  value  for  social 
applause)  or  of  deep  musical  sensibility  ;  neither  of  which 
belonged  to  Miss  Wordsworth's  constitution  of  mind.  But, 
as  everybody  agrees  in  our  days  to  think  this  accomplish- 
ment of  no  value  whatever,  and,  in  fact,  unproduceahle^ 
unless  in  an  exquisite  state  of  culture,  no  complaint  could 
be  made  on  that  score,  nor  any  surprise  felt.  But  the 
case  in  which  the  irregularity  of  Miss  Wordsworth's  edu- 
cation did  astonish  one,  was  in  that  part  which  respected 

*  Viz.  *  Calypso  ne  savoit  se  consoler  du  depart/  &c.  For  how 
long  a  period,  viz.  nearly  two  centuries  has  Calypso  been  inconso- 
lable in  the  morning  studies  of  young  ladies  !  As  Fenelon's  most 
dreary  romance  always  opened  at  one  or  other  of  these  three  earliest 
O-nd  dreary  pages,  naturally  to  my  sympathetic  fancy  the  poor  un- 
nappy  goddess  seemed  to  be  eternally  aground  on  this  Goodwin  Sand 
pf  inconsolability.  It  is  amongst  the  standing  hypocrisies  of  the 
world,  that  most  people  affect  a  reverence  for  this  book,  which 
nobody  reads. 


WILLIAM  WORDSWOKTH. 


367 


her  literary  knowledge.  In  whatever  she  read,  or  neglected 
to  read,  she  had  obeyed  the  single  impulse  of  her  own 
heart ;  where  that  led  her,  there  she  followed :  where 
that  was  mute  or  indifferent,  not  a  thought  had  she  to 
bestow  upon  a  writer's  high  reputation,  or  the  call  for 
some  acquaintance  with  his  works,  to  meet  the  demands 
of  society.  And  thus  the  strange  anomaly  arose,  of  a 
woman  deeply  acquainted  with  some  great  authors,  whose 
works  lie  pretty  much  out  of  the  fashionable  beat ;  able, 
moreover,  in  her  own  person,  to  produce  brilliant  effects  ; 
able,  on  some  subjects,  to  write  delightfully,  and  with  the 
impress  of  originality  upon  all  she  uttered  —  and  yet 
ignorant  of  great  classical  works  in  her  own  mother 
tongue,  and  careless  of  literary  history,  unless,  where  it 
touched  upon  some  topic  of  household  interest,  in  a  degree 
which  at  once  exiled  her  from  the  rank  and  privileges  of 
llue-stockingism. 

The  reader  may  perhaps  have  objected  silently  to  the 
illustration  drawn  from  Miss  Mitford,  that  *  Cousin  Mary ' 
does  not  effect  her  fascinations  out  of  pure  negations. 
Such  negations,  from  the  mere  startling  effect  of  their 
oddity  in  this  present  age,  might  fall  in  with  the  general 
current  of  her  attractions  ;  but  Cousin  Mary's  undoubtedly 
lay  in  the  positive  witcheries  of  a  manner  and  a  charac- 
ter, transcending,  by  force  of  irresistible  nature,  (as  in 
\  similar  case  recorded  by  Wordsworth  in  *  The  Excur- 
Lion,')  all  the  pomp  of  nature  and  art  united,  as  seen  in 
ordinary  creatures.  Now,  in  Miss  Wordsworth,  there  were 
certainly  no  '  Cousin  Mary '  fascinations  of  manner  and 
deportment,  that  snatch  a  grace  oeyond  the  reach  of  art : 
there  she  was  indeed  painfully  deficient ;  for  hurry  mars 
and  defeats  even  the  most  ordinary  expression  of  the  femi- 
nine character,  its  gentleness  :  abruptness  and  trepidation 
leave  ofter  a  joint  impression  of  what  seems  for  an  instan* 


368 


LITERAKY  REMINISCENCES. 


both  rudeness  and  ungracefulness ;  and  the  least  painful 
impression  was  that  of  unsexual  awkwardness  ;  —  but  the 
point  in  Tvhich  Miss  Wordsworth  made  the  most  ample 
amends  for  all  that  she  wanted  of  more  customary  accom- 
plishments, was,  this  very  originality  and  native  freshness 
of  intellect,  which  settled  with  so  bewitching  an  effect  upon 
some  of  her  writings,  and  upon  many  a  sudden  remark  or 
ejaculation,  extorted  by  something  or  other  that  struck  her 
eye,  in  the  clouds,  or  in  coloring,  or  in  accidents  of  light 
and  shade,  of  form,  or  combination  of  form.  To  talk  of 
her  '  writings,'  is  too  pompous  an  expression,  or  at  least 
far  beyond  any  pretensions  that  she  ever  made  for  herself. 
Of  poetry  she  has  written  little  indeed  ;  and  that  little 
not,  in  my  opinion,  of  much  merit.  The  verses  pub- 
lished by  her  brother,  and  beginning  —  *  Which  way  does 
the  wind  come  ? '  meant  only  as  nursery  lines,  are  cer- 
tainly wild  and  pretty  ;  but  the  other  specimen  is  likely 
to  strike  most  readers  as  feeble  and  trivial  in  the  senti- 
ment. Meantime,  the  book  which  is  in  very  deed  a  mon- 
ument to  her  power  of  catching  and  expressing  all  the 
hidden  beauties  of  natural  scenery,  with  a  felicity  of  dic- 
tion, a  truth,  and  strength,  that  far  transcend  Gilpin,  oi 
professional  writers  on  those  subjects,  is  her  record  of  a 
tour  in  Scotland,  made  about  the  year  1802.  This  book, 
unless  my  recollection  of  it,  from  a  period  now  gone  by 
"or  thirty  years,  has  deceived  me,  is  absolutely  unique  in 
its  class  :  and,  though  it  never  could  be  very  popular, 
from  the  minuteness  of  its  details,  and  the  luxuriation  of 
the  descriptions,  yet  I  believe  no  person  has  ever  been 
favored  with  a  sight  of  it,  that  has  not  regretted  that  it 
/s  not  published.  Its  own  extraordinary  merit,  apart  from 
Ihe  interest  which  now  invests  the  name  of  Wordsworth 
could  not  fail  to  procure  purchasers  for  one  edition,  on  iti 
first  appearance. 


WILLIAM  WORDSWORTH. 


369 


Coleridge  was  of  the  party  at  first ;  but  afterwards, 
ander  some  attack  of  rheumatism,  found  or  thought  it 
necessary  to  leave  them.  Melancholy  it  would  be  at  this 
time,  thirty-six  years  and  more  from  the  era  of  that  tour, 
to  read  it  under  the  afflicting  remembrances  of  all  which 
has  been  suffered  in  the  interval  by  two  at  least  out  of  the 
three  who  composed  the  travelling  party  ;  for  I  fear  that 
Miss  Wordsworth  has  suffered  not  much  less  than  Coler- 
idge :  and,  in  any  general  expression  of  it,  from  the  same 
cause  —  viz.  an  excess  of  pleasurable  excitement  and 
luxurious  sensibility,  sustained  in  youth  by  a  constitutional 
glow  from  animal  causes,  but  drooping  as  soon  as  that  was 
withdrawn.  It  is  painful  to  point  a  moral  from  any  story 
connected  with  those  whom  one  loves  or  has  loved  ;  pain- 
ful to  look  for  one  moment  towards  any  '  improvement ' 
of  such  a  case,  especially  where  there  is  no  reason  to  tax 
the  parties  with  any  criminal  contribution  to  their  own 
sufferings,  except  through  that  relaxation  of  the  will  and 
its  potential  energies,  through  which  most  of  us,  at  some 
time  or  other  —  I  myself  too  deeply  and  sorrowfully  — 
stand  accountable  to  our  own  consciences.  Not,  there- 
fore, with  any  more  intention  of  speaking  in  a  monitorial 
or  censorial  character,  than  in  passing,  after  dark,  through 
Grasmere  churchyard,  and  trespassing  a  little  to  the  left,  I 
could  be  supposed  to  have  the  intention  of  trampling  upon 
the  grave  of  one  who  lies  buried  near  the  pathway,  and 
Vhom  once  I  loved  in  extremity,  do  I  here  notice  a  defect 
ia  Miss  Wordsworth's  self- education  of  something  that 
flight  have  mitigated  the  sort  of  suffering  which,  more  or 
less,  ever  since  the  period  of  her  too  genial,  too  radiant 
youth,  I  suppose  her  to  have  struggled  with.  I  have  men- 
tioned the  narrow  basis  on  which  her  literary  interests 
had  been  made  to  rest  —  the  exclusive  character  of  her 
reading,  and  the  utter  want  of  pretension,  and  of  all  that 
24 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


looks  like  hlue-stockingism  in  the  style  of  her  habitual 
conversation  and  mode  of  dealing  with  literature.  Now, 
to  me  it  appears,  upon  reflection,  that  it  would  have  been 
far  better  had  Miss  Wordsworth  condescended  a  little  to 
the  ordinary  mode  of  pursuing  literature  ;  better  for  her 
own  happiness  if  she  had  been  a  blue-stocking :  or,  at 
least,  if  she  had  been,  in  good  earnest,  a  writer  for  the 
press,  with  the  pleasant  cares  and  solicitudes  of  one  who 
has  some  little  ventures,  as  it  were,  on  that  vast  ocean. 

We  all  know  with  how  womanly  and  serene  a  temper 
literature  has  been  pursued  by  Joanna  Baillie,  by  Miss 
Mitford,  and  other  women  of  admirable  genius  —  witu 
how  absolutely  no  sacrifice  or  loss  of  feminine  dignity 
they  have  cultivated  the  profession  of  authorship  ;  and, 
if  we  could  hear  their  report,  I  have  no  doubt  that  the 
little  cares  of  correcting  proofs,  and  the  forward-looking 
solicitudes  connected  with  the  mere  business  arrange- 
ments of  new  publications,  would  be  numbered  amongst 
the  minor  pleasures  of  life  ;  whilst  the  more  elevated 
cares  connected  with  the  intellectual  business  of  such 
projects,  must  inevitably  have  done  much  to  solace  the 
troubles,  which  as  human  beings,  they  cannot  but  have 
experienced  ;  and  even  to  scatter  flowers  upon  their  path. 
Mrs.  Johnstone,  of  Edinburgh,  has  pursued  the  profession 
of  literature  —  the  noblest  of  professions,  and  the  only 
one  open  to  both  sexes  alike  —  with  even  more  assiduity, 
and  as  a  daily  occupation  ;  and,  I  have  every  reason  to 
believe  with  as  much  benefit  to  her  own  happiness,  as  to 
ihe  instruction  and  amusement  of  her  readers  :  —  for  the 
petty  cares  of  authorship  are  agreeable,  and  its  serious 
cares  are  ennobling.  More  especially  is  such  an  occupa- 
tion useful  to  a  woman  without  children,  and  without  any 
prospective  resources  ;  resources  in  objects  that  involve 
hopes  growing  and  ^mfullilled.    It  is  too  much  to  expect 


WILLIAM  WOKDSWORTH. 


371 


d1  any  woman  (or  man  either)  that  her  mind  should  sup* 
port  itself  in  a  pleasurable  activity,  under  the  drooping 
energies  of  life,  by  resting  on  the  past  or  on  the  present ; 
Bome  interest  in  reversion,  some  subject  of  hope  from  day 
to  day,  must  be  called  in  to  reinforce  the  animal  fountains 
of  good  spirits.  Had  that  been  opened  for  Miss  Words- 
worth, I  am  satisfied  that  she  would  have  passed  a  more 
cheerful  middle-age,  and  w^ould  not,  at  any  period,  have 
yielded  to  that  nervous  depression  which,  I  grieve  to  hear, 
has  clouded  her  latter  days.  Nephews  and  nieces,  whilst 
young  and  innocent,  are  as  good  almost  as  sons  and 
daughters  to  a  fervid  and  loving  heart  that  has  carried 
them  in  her  arms  from  the  hour  they  were  born.  But, 
after  a  nephew  has  grown  into  a  huge  hulk  of  a  man,  six 
feet  high,  and  as  stout  as  a  bullock ;  after  he  has  come 
to  have  children  of  his  own,  lives  at  a  distance,  and  finds 
occasion  to  talk  chiefly  of  oxen  and  turnips  —  no  ofi*ence 
to  him  —  he  ceases  to  be  an  object  of  any  very  profound 
sentiment.  There  is  nothing  in  such  a  subject  to  rouse 
the  flagging  pulses  of  the  heart,  and  to  sustain  a  fervid 
spirit,  to  whom,  at  the  very  best,  human  life  off*ers  little  of 
an  adequate  or  sufiicing  interest,  unless  when  idealized  by 
the  magic  of  the  mighty  poets.  Farewell,  Miss  Words- 
worth !  farewell,  impassioned  Dorothy !  I  have  not  seen 
you  for  many  a  day  —  shall  never  see  you  again  perhaps ; 
but  shall  attend  your  steps  with  f  "^'^der  thought,  so  long 
as  I  hear  of  you  living  :  so  will  Professor  Wilson  ;  and, 
from  two  hearts,  at  least,  that  loved  and  admired  you  in 
your  fervid  prime,  it  may  sometimes  cheer  the  gloom  of 
vour  depression  to  be  assured  of  never-failing  remem- 
brance full  of  love  and  respectful  pity. 

Here  ceases  my  record  of  the  life  and  its  main  incidents, 
80  far  as  they  are  known  to  me,  of  William  Wordsworth ; 
U)  which,  on  account  of  the  important  services  which  she 


372 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


has  rendered  him  ;  on  account  of  the  separate  interest 
which,  apart  from  those  services,  belongs  to  her  own  mind 
and  character  ;  on  account  of  the  singular  counterpart 
which  in  some  features  they  offer  to  those  of  her  brother ; 
and,  on  account  of  the  impressive  coincidence  and  paral- 
lelism in  this  remarkable  dedication  of  Dorothy  to 
William  Wordsworth,  with  that  of  Mary  to  Charles  Lamb 
—  I  have  thought  that  it  would  be  a  proper  compTement  of 
the  whole  record,  to  subjoin  a  very  especial  notice  of  his 
sister.  Miss  Wordsworth  would  have  merited  a  separate 
notice  in  any  biographical  dictionary  of  our  times,  had 
there  even  been  no  William  Wordsworth  in  existence. 

I  have  traced  the  history  of  each  until  the  time  when  I 
became  personally  acquainted  with  them ;  and,  hence- 
forwards,  anything  which  it  may  be  interesting  to  know 
with  respect  to  either,  will  naturally  come  forward,  not  in 
a  separate  narrative,  but  in  connection  with  my  own  life  ; 
for,  in  the  following  year,  I  became  myself  the  tenant  of 
that  pretty  cottage  in  which  I  found  them ;  and  from  that 
time,  for  many  years,  my  life  flowed  on  in  daily  union 
with  theirs. 


WORDSWORTH  AND  SOUTHET, 


876 


CHAPTER  XIII. 


WILLIAM  WORDSWORTH  AND  ROBERT  SOUTHET. 


That  night  —  the  first  of  my  personal  intercourse  with 
Wordsworth  —  the  first  in  which  I  saw  him  face  to  face  — 
was  (it  is  little,  indeed,  to  say)  memorable  :  it  was  marked 
by  a  change  even  in  the  physical  condition  of  my  nervous 
system.  Long  disappointment — hope  for  ever  baffled, 
(and  why  should  it  be  less  painful  because  ^eZf-baffled  ?) 
—  vexation  and  self-blame,  almost  self-contempt,  at  my 
own  want  of  courage  to  face  the  man  whom  of  all  since 
the  Flood  I  most  yearned  to  behold :  —  these  feelings  had 
impressed  upon  my  nervous  sensibilities  a  character  of 
irritation  —  agitation  —  restlessness  —  eternal  self-dissatis- 
faction —  which  were  gradually  gathering  into  a  distinct, 
well-defined  type,  that  would,  but  for  youth  —  almighty 
youth,  and  the  spirit  of  youth  —  have  shaped  itself  into 
some  nervous  complaint,  wearing  symptoms  sui  generis, 
(for  most  nervous  complaints,  in  minds  that  are  at  all 
eccentric,  will  be  sui  generis ;)  and,  perhaps,  finally,  have 
been  immortalized  in  some  medical  journal  as  the  anoma- 
lous malady  of  an  interesting  young  gentleman,  aged 


374 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


twenty- two,  who  was  supposed  to  liave  studied  too  se- 
verely, and  to  have  perplexed  his  brain  with  German 
metaphysics.  To  this  result  things  tended  ;  but,  in  one 
hour,  all  passed  away.  It  was  gone,  never  to  return. 
The  spiritual  being  whom  I  had  anticipated  —  for,  like 
Eloise, 

«  My  fancy  framed  him  of  th'  angelic  kind  — 
Some  emanation  of  the  all  beauteous  mind  '  — 

this  ideal  creature  had  at  length  been  seen  —  seen  '  in  the 
flesh  '  —  seen  with  fleshly  eyes  ;  and  now,  though  he  did 
not  cease  for  years  to  wear  something  of  the  glory  and  the 
aureola  which,  in  Popish  legends,  invests  the  head  of 
superhuman  beings,  yet  it  was  no  longer  as  a  being  to  be 
feared  —  it  was  as  Raphael,  the  '  aflable  '  angel,  who  con  - 
versed  on  the  terms  of  man  with  man,  that  I  now  regarded 
him. 

It  was  four  o'clock,  perhaps,  when  we  arrived.  At  that 
hour  the  daylight  soon  declined  ;  and,  in  an  hour  and  a 
half,  we  were  all  collected  about  the  tea-table.  This,  with 
the  Wordsworths,  under  the  simple  rustic  system  of  habits 
which  they  cherished  then,  and  for  twenty  years  after,  was 
the  most  delightful  meal  in  the  day  ;  just  as  dinner  is  in 
great  cities,  and  for  the  same  reason  —  because  it  was 
prolonged  into  a  meal  of  leisure  and  conversation.  And 
the  reason  why  any  meal  favors  and  encourages  conversa- 
tion is  pretty  much  the  same  as  that  which  accounts  for 
the  breaking  down  of  so  many  lawyers,  and  generally 
their  ill-success  in  the  House  of  Commons.  In  the  courts 
of  law,  when  a  man  is  haranguing  upon  general  and  ab- 
stract topics,  if  at  any  moment  he  feels  getting  beyond  his 
depth,  if  he  finds  his  anchor  driving,  he  can  always  bring 
up,  and  drop  his  anchor  anew  upon  the  terra  jirma  of  his 
case  :  the  facts  of  this,  as  furnished  by  his  brief,  always 
assure  him  of  a  retreat  as  soon  as  he  finds  his  mora 


WORDSWORTH   4lND  SOXTTHEY. 


37o 


geneial  thouglits  failing  him  ;  and  the  consciousness  of 
this  retreat,  by  inspiring  confidence,  makes  it  much  less 
probable  that  they  should  fail.  But,  in  Parliament,  where 
the  advantage  of  a  case  with  given  facts  and  circum- 
stances, or  the  details  of  a  statistical  report,  does  not  offer 
itself  once  in  a  dozen  times  that  a  member  has  occasion 
to  speak  —  where  he  has  to  seek  unpremeditated  argu- 
ments and  reasonings  of  a  general  nature,  from  the  im- 
possibility of  wholly  evading  the  previous  speeches  that 
may  have  made  an  impression  upon  the  House  ;  —  this 
necessity,  at  any  rate  a  trying  one  to  most  people,  is 
doubly  so  to  one  who  has  always  walked  in  the  leading- 
strings  of  a  case  —  always  swam  with  the  help  of  bladders, 
in  the  conscious  resource  of  his  facts.  The  reason,  there- 
fore, why  a  lawyer  succeeds  ill  as  a  senator,  is  to  be  found 
in  the  sudden  removal  of  an  artificial  aid.  Now,  just  such 
an  artificial  aid  is  furnished  to  timid  or  to  unready  men  by 
a  dinner-table,  and  the  miscellaneous  attentions,  courtesies, 
or  occupations  which  it  enjoins  or  permits,  as  by  the  fixed 
memoranda  of  a  brief.  If  a  man  finds  the  ground  slipping 
from  beneath  him  in  a  discussion  —  if,  in  a  tide  of  illustra- 
tion, he  suddenly  comes  to  a  pause  for  want  of  matter  — 
he  can  make  a  graceful  close,  a  self-interruption,  that  shall 
wear  the  interpretation  of  forbearance,  or  even  win  the 
rhetorical  credit  of  an  aposiopesis,  (according  to  circum- 
stances,) by  stopping  to  perform  a  duty  of  the  occasion  : 
pressed  into  a  dilemma  by  some  political  partisan,  one 
may  evade  it  by  pressing  him  to  take  a  little  of  the  dish 
before  one  ;  or,  plagued  for  a  reason  which  is  not  forth- 
coming, one  may  deprecate  this  logical  rigor  by  inviting 
one's  tormentor  to  wine.  I.i  short,  what  I  mean  to  say  is, 
that  a  dinner  party,  or  any  meal  which  is  made  the  meal 
for  intellectual  relaxation,  must  for  ever  offer  the  advan- 
^ges  of  a  palcBstra,  in  which  the  weapons  are  foils  and 


376 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


the  wounds  not  mortal :  in  which,  whilst  the  interest  la 
that  of  a  real,  the  danger  is  that  of  a  sham  fight :  in  which 
whilst  there  is  always  an  opportunity  for  swimming  into 
deep  waters,  there  is  always  a  retreat  into  shallow  ones. 
And  it  may  be  laid  down  as  a  maxim,  that  no  nation  is 
civilized  to  the  height  of  its  capacity  until  it  has  one  such 
meal.  With  our  ancestors  of  sixty  years  back,  this  meal 
was  supper  :  with  the  Athenians  and  Greeks  it  was  din- 
ner,^ (coena  and  diinvov,^  as  with  ourselves  ;  only  that  the 
hour  was  a  very  early  one,  in  consequence,  partly,  of  the 
early  bedtime  of  these  nations,  (which  again  was  occa- 
sioned by  the  dearness  of  candle-light  to  the  mass  of  those 
who  had  political  rights,  on  whose  account  the  forensic 
meetings,  the  visits  of  clients  to  their  patrons,  &c.,  opened 
the  political  day  by  four  hours  earlier  than  with  us,)  and 
partly  in  consequence  of  the  uncommercial  habits  of  the 
ancients  —  commerce  having  at  no  time  created  an  aris- 
tocracy of  its  own,  and,  therefore,  having  at  no  time  and 
in  no  city  (no,  not  Alexandria  nor  Carthage)  dictated  the 
household  and  social  arrangements,  or  the  distribution  of 
its  hours. 

I  have  been  led  insensibly  into  this  digression.  I  now 
resume  the  thread  of  my  narrative.  That  night,  after 
hearing  conversation  superior  by  much,  in  its  tone  and 
subject,  to  any  which  I  had  ever  heard  before  —  one  ex- 

♦  A  curious  dissertation  might  be  written  on  this  subject.  Mean- 
time, it  is  remarkable  that  almost  all  modern  nations  have  committed 
the  blunder  of  supposing  the  Latin  word  for  supper  to  be  ccena,  and 
of  dinner,  prandium.  Now,  the  essential  definition  of  dinner  is, 
that  which  is  the  main  meal —  (what  the  French  call  the  great  meal.) 
By  that  or  any  test,  (for  example,  the  iimc,  three  p.  m.)  the 
Roman  coena  was  dinner.  Even  Louis  XII.,  whose  death  is  partly 
ascribed  to  his  having  altered  his  dinner  hour  from  nine  to  eleven 
4.  M.  in  compliment  to  his  young  English  bride,  did  not  sup  at  thre« 

P.  M 


-WORDSWORTH  AND  SOUTHEY. 


377 


ception  only  being  made,  in  favor  of  Coleridge,  whose 
style  differed  from  Wordsworth's  in  this,  that  being  fai 
more  agile  and  more  comprehensive,  consequently  more 
showy  and  surprising,  it  was  less  impressive  and  weighty  ; 
for  Wordsworth's  was  slow  in  its  movement,  solemn, 
majestic.  After  a  luxury  so  rare  as  this,  I  found  myself, 
about  eleven  at  night,  in  a  pretty  bedroom,  about  fourteen 
feet  by  twelve.  Much  I  feared  that  this  might  turn  out 
the  best  room  in  the  house ;  and  it  illustrates  the  hospital- 
ity of  my  new  friends,  to  mention  that  it  was.  Early  in 
the  morning,  I  was  awoke  by  a  little  voice,  issuing  from  a 
little  cottage  bed  in  an  opposite  corner,  soliloquizing  in  a 
!low  tone.  I  soon  recognized  the  words  — '  Suffered  under 
Pontius  Pilate ;  was  crucified,  dead,  and  buried ; '  and  the 
voice  I  easily  conjectured  to  be  that  of 'the  eldest  amongst 
Wordsworth's  children,  a  son,  and  at  that  time  about  three 
years  old.  He  was  a  remarkably  fine  boy  in  strength  and 
size,  promising  (which  has  in  fact  been  realized)  a  much 
more  powerful  person,  physically,  than  that  of  his  father. 
Miss  Wordsworth  I  found  making  breakfast  in  the  little 
sitting-room.  No  urn  was  there  ;  no  glittering  breakfast 
service ;  a  kettle  boiled  upon  the  fire,  and  everything  was 
in  harmony  with  these  unpretending  arrangements.  I,  the 
son  of  a  merchant,  and  naturally,  therefore,  in  the  midst 
of  luxurious  (though  not  ostentatious)  display  from  my 
childhood,  had  never  seen  so  humble  a  menage  :  and  con- 
trasting the  dignity  of  the  man  with  this  honorable  poverty, 
and  this  courageous  avowal  of  it,  his  utter  absence  of  all 
effort  to  disguise  the  simple  truth  of  the  case,  I  felt  my 
admiration  increase  to  the  uttermost  by  all  I  saw.  This, 
thought  I  to  myself,  is,  indeed,  in  his  own  words  — 

*  Plain  living,  and  high  thinking.* 
This  is  indeed  to  reserve  the  humility  and  the  parsimonies 


378  LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 

of  lifb  for  its  bodily  enjoyments,  and  to  apply  its  lavishnesa 
and  its  luxury  to  its  enjoyments  of  the  intellect.  So  might 
Mi"^ton  have  lived  ;  so  Marvell.  Throughout  the  day  — 
which  was  rainy  —  the  same  style  of  modest  hospitality 
prevailed.  Wordsworth  and  his  sister  —  myself  being  of 
the  party  —  walked  out  in  spite  of  the  rain,  and  made  the 
circuit  of  the  two  lakes,  Grasmere  and  its  dependency 
Rydal  —  a  walk  of  about  six  miles.  On  the  third  day, 
Mrs.  Coleridge  having  now  pursued  her  journey  northward 
to  Keswick,  and  having,  at  her  departure,  invited  me,  in 
her  own  name  as  well  as  Southey's,  to  come  and  see  them, 
Wordsworth  proposed  that  we  should  go  thither  in  com- 
pany, but  not  by  ^he  direct  route  —  a  distance  of  only 
thirteen  miles :  this  we  were  to  take  in  our  road  home- 
ward;  our  outward-bound  journey  was  to  be  by  way  of 
Ulleswater  —  a  circuit  of  forty- three  miles. 

On  the  third  morning  after  my  arrival  in  Grasmere,  I 
found  the  whole  family,  except  the  two  children,  prepared 
for  the  expedition  across  the  mountains.  I  had  heard  of 
no  horses,  and  took  it  for  granted  that  we  were  to  walk ; 
however,  at  the  moment  of  starting,  a  cart  —  the  common 
farmers'  cart  of  the  country  —  made  its  appearance  ;  and 
the  driver  was  a  bonny  young  woman  of  the  vale.  Such 
a  vehicle  I  had  never  in  my  life  seen  used  for  such  a 
purpose  ;  but  what  was  good  enough  for  the  Wordsworths 
was  good  enough  for  me ;  and,  accordingly,  we  were  all 
carted  along  to  the  little  town,  or  large  village,  of  Amble- 
side —  three  and  a  half  miles  distant.  Our  style  oi 
travelling  occasioned  no  astonishment;  on  the  contrary, 
we  met  a  smiling  salutation  wherever  we  appeared  — 
Miss  Wordsworth  being,  as  I  observed,  the  person  most 
familiarly  known  of  our  party,  and  the  one  who  took 
upon  herself  the  whole  expenses  of  the  flying  colloquies 
exchanged  with  stragglers  on  the  road.    What  struck  me 


WOIIDSAVORTH  AND  SOUTHEY. 


379 


svith  most  astonishment,  however,  was  the  liberal  mariner 
of  our  fair  driver,  who  made  no  scruple  of  taking  a  leap, 
with  the  reins  in  her  hand,  and  seating  herself  dexter- 
ously upon  the  shafts  (or,  in  Westmoreland  phrase,  the 
trams)  of  the  cart.  From  Ambleside  —  and  without  one 
foot  of  intervening  flat  ground  —  begins  to  rise  the  famous 
ascent  of  Kirkstone ;  after  which,  for  three  long  miles, 
all  riding  in  a  cart  drawn  by  one  horse  becomes  impos- 
sible. The  ascent  is  computed  at  three  miles,  but  is, 
probably,  a  little  more.  In  some  parts  it  is  almost  fright- 
fully steep ;  for  the  road  being  only  the  original  mountain 
track  of  shepherds,  gradually  widened  and  improved  from 
age  to  age,  (especially  since  the  era  of  tourists  began,)  is 
carried  over  ground  which  no  engineer,  even  in  alpine 
countries,  would  have  viewed  as  practicable.  In  ascend- 
ing, this  is  felt  chiefly  as  an  obstruction  and  not  as  a  peril, 
unless  where  there  is  a  risk  of  the  horses  backing ;  but  in 
the  reverse  order,  some  of  these  precipitous  descents  are 
terrific  :  and  yet,  once  in  utter  darkness,  after  midnight, 
and  the  darkness  irradiated  only  by  continual  streams  of 
lightning,  I  was  driven  down  this  whole  descent,  at  a  full 
gallop,  by  a  young  woman  —  the  carriage  being  a  light 
one,  the  horses  frightened,  and  the  descents,  at  some 
critical  parts  of  the  road,  so  literally  like  the  sides  of  a 
house,  that  it  was  difficult  to  keep  the  fore  wheels  from 
pressing  upon  the  hind  legs  of  the  horses.  Indeed,  this 
is  only  according  to  the  custom  of  the  country,  as  I  have 
before  mentioned.  The  innkeeper  of  Ambleside,  or  Low- 
wood,  will  not  mount  this  formidable  hill  without  four 
horses.  The  leaders  you  are  not  required  to  take  beyond 
the  first  three  miles ;  but,  of  course,  they  are  glad  if  you 
will  take  them  on  the  whole  stage  of  nine  miles,  to  Pat- 
terdalc ;  and,  in  that  case,  there  is  a  real  luxury  at  hand 
'or  those  who  enjoy  velocity  of  motion.    The  descent 


380 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES, 


into  Patterdale  is  much  above  two  miles ;  but  such  Is  tht 
propensity  for  flying  down  hills  in  Westmoreland,  that  1 
have  found  the  descent  accomplished  in  about  six  minutes, 
which  is  at  the  rate  of  eighteen  miles  an  hour ;  the  various 
turnings  of  the  road  making  the  speed  much  more  sensible 
to  the  traveller.  The  pass,  at  the  summit  of  this  ascent, 
is  nothing  to  be  compared  in  sublimity  with  the  pass 
under  Great  Gavil  from  Wastdalehead ;  but  it  is  solemn, 
and  profoundly  impressive.  At  a  height  so  awful  as  this, 
it  may  be  easily  supposed  that  all  human  dwellings  Lave 
been  long  left  behind :  no  sound  of  human  life,  no  bells 
of  churches  or  chapels  ever  ascend  so  far.  And,  as  is 
noticed  in  Wordsworth's  fine  stanzas  upon  this  memoifable 
pass,  the  only  sound  that,  even  in  noonday,  disturbs  the 
sleep  of  the  weary  pedestrian,  is  that  of  the  bee  murmur- 
ing amongst  the  mountain  flowers  —  a  sound  as  ancient 

*  As  man's  imperial  front,  and  woman's  roseate  bloom.' 

This  way,  and  (which,  to  the  sentiment  of  the  case,  is  an 
important  point)  this  way,  of  necessity  and  inevitably ^ 
passed  the  Roman  legions ;  for  it  is  a  mathematic  impos- 
sibility that  any  other  route  could  be  found  for  an  army 
nearer  to  the  eastward  of  this  pass  than  by  way  of 
Kendal  and  Shap ;  nearer  to  the  westward,  than  by  way 
of  Legbesthwaite  and  St.  John's  Vale,  (and  so  by  ThreL- 
keld  to  Penrith.)  Now,  these  two  roads  are  exactly 
twenty-five  miles  apart ;  and,  since  a  Roman  cohort  was 
stationed  at  Ambleside,  {Amhoglana,)  it  is  pretty  evident 
that  this  cohort  would  not  correspond  with  the  more 
northerly  stations  by  either  of  these  remote  routes  — 
having  immediately  before  it  this  direct  though  difficult 
pass  to  Kirkstone.  On  the  solitary  area  of  table-land 
which  you  find  at  the  summit  —  though,  Heaven  knows, 
you  might  almost  cover  it  with  a  drawing-room  carpet, 


WORDSWORTH  AND  SOUTHET. 


381 


BO  suddenly  does  the  mountain  take  to  its  old  trick  of 
precipitous  descent,  on  both  sides  alike  —  there  are  only 
two  objects  to  remind  you  of  man  and  his  workmanship. 
One  is  a  guide-post  —  always  a  picturesque  and  interest- 
ing object,  because  it  expresses  a  wild  country  and  a 
labyrinth  of  roads,  and  often  made  much  more  interesting 
(as  in  this  case)  by  the  lichens  which  cover  it,  and  which 
record  the  generations  of  men  to  whom  it  has  done  its 
office ;  as  also  by  the  crucifix  form  which  inevitably 
recall,  in  all  mountainous  regions,  the  crosses  of  Catholic 
lands,  raised  to  the  memory  of  wayfaring  men  who  havp 
perished  by  the  hand  of  the  assassin. 

The  other  memorial  of  man  is  even  more  interesting  : 
—  Amongst  the  fragments  of  rock  which  lie  in  the  con- 
fusion of  a  ruin  on  each  side  of  the  road,  one  there  is, 
which  exceeds  the  rest  in  height,  and  which,  in  shape, 
presents  a  very  close  resemblance  to  a  church.  This  lies 
to  the  left  of  the  road  as  you  are  going  from  Ambleside  ; 
and,  from  its  name,  Churchstone,  (Kirkstone,)  is  derived 
the  name  of  the  pass,  and  from  the  pass  the  name  of  the 
mountain.  The  guide-post  —  which  was  really  the  work 
of  man  —  tells  those  going  southwards  (for  to  those  who 
go  northwards  it  is  useless,  since,  in  that  direction,  there 
is  no  choice  of  roads)  that  the  left  hand  track  conducts 
you  to  Troutbeck,  and  Bowness,  and  Kendal ;  the  right 
hand  to  Ambleside,  and  Hawkshead,  and  Ulverstone. 
The  church  —  which  is  but  a  phantom  of  man's  handi- 
work —  might,  however,  really  be  mistaken  for  such, 
were  it  not  that  the  rude  and  almost  inaccessible  state  of 
the  adjacent  ground  proclaims  the  truth.  As  to  size,  that 
is  remarkably  difficult  to  estimate  upon  wild  heaths  or 
mountain  solitudes,  where  there  are  no  leadings  through 
gradations  of  distance,  nor  any  artificial  standards,  from 
which  height  or  breadth  can  be  properly  deduced.  This 


582 


LITERARY  BEMINISCENCES. 


mimic  church,  however,  has  a  peculiarly  fine  effect  in 
this  wild  situation,  which  leaves  so  far  below  the  tumults 
of  this  world  :  the  phantom  church,  by  suggesting  the 
phantom  and  evanescent  image  of  a  congregation,  where 
never  congregation  met ;  of  the  pealing  organ,  where 
never  sound  was  heard  except  of  wild  natural  notes,  or 
else  of  the  wind  rushing  through  these  mighty  gates  of 
everlasting  rock  —  in  this  way,  the  fanciful  image  that 
accompanies  the  traveller  on  his  road,  for  a  half  a  mile  or 
more,  serves  to  bring  out  the  antagonist  feeling  of  intense 
and  awful  solitude,  which  is  the  natural  and  presiding 
sentiment  —  the  religio  loci  —  that  broods  for  ever  over 
the  romantic  pass. 

Having  walked  up  Kirkstone,  we  ascended  our  cart 
again  ;  then  rapidly  descended  to  Brothers'  Water  —  a 
lake  which  lies  immediately  below  ;  and,  about  three 
miles  further,  through  endless  woods  and  under  the  shade 
of  mighty  fells,  immediate  dependencies  and  processes  of 
the  still  more  mighty  Helvellyn,  we  approached  the  vale 
of  Patterdale,  when,  by  moonlight,  we  reached  the  inn. 
Here  we  found  horses  —  by  whom  furnished  I  never 
asked  nor  heard ;  perhaps  I  owe  somebody  for  a  horse  to 
this  day.  All  I  remember  is — that  through  those  most 
romantic  woods  and  rocks  of  Stybarren  —  through  those 
silent  glens  of  Glencoin  and  Glenridding  —  through  that 
most  romantic  of  parks  then  belonging  to  the  Duke  of 
Norfolk,  viz.  Gobarrow  Park — we  saw  alternately,  for 
four  miles,  the  most  grotesque  and  the  most  awful  specta- 
cles — 

*  Abbey  windows 
And  Moorish  temples  of  the  Hindoos,' 

all  fantastic,  all  as  unreal  and  shadowy  as  the  moonligh* 
which  created  them  ;  whilst,  at  every  angle  of  the  road, 
broad  gleams  came  upwards  of  Ulleswater,  stretching  for 


■WORDSWORTH  AND  SOUTHET.  383 

nine  miles  northward,  but,  fortunately  for  its  effect,  broken 
into  three  watery  chambers  of  almost  equal  length,  and 
rarely  visible  at  once.  At  the  foot  of  the  lake,  in  a  house 
called  Ewsmere,  we  passed  the  night,  having  accomplished 
about  twenty-two  miles  only  in  our  day's  walking  and 
riding.  The  next  day  Wordsworth  and  I,  leaving  at  Ews- 
mere the  rest  of  our  party,  spent  the  morning  in  roaming 
through  the  woods  of  Lowther,  and,  towards  evening,  we 
dined  together  at  Emont  Bridge,  one  mile  short  of 
Penrith.  Afterwards,  we  walked  into  Penrith.  There 
Wordsworth  left  me  in  excellent  quarters  —  the  house  of 
Captain  Wordsworth,  from  which  the  family  happened  to 
be  absent.  Whither  he  himself  adjourned,  I  know  not, 
nor  on  what  business  ;  however,  it  occupied  him  through- 
out the  next  day  ;  and,  therefore,  I  employed  myself  in 
sauntering  along  the  road,  about  seventeen  miles,  to 
Keswick.  There  I  had  been  directed  to  ask  for  Greta 
Hall,  which,  with  some  little  difficulty,  I  found  ;  for  it 
stands  out  of  the  town  a  few  hundred  yards,  upon  a  little 
eminence  overhanging  the  river  Greta.  It  was  about 
seven  o'clock  when  I  reached  Southey's  door  ;  for  I  had 
stopped  to  dine  at  a  little  public  house  in  Threlkeld,  and 
had  walked  slowly  for  the  last  two  hours  in  the  dark. 
The  arrival  of  a  stranger  occasioned  a  little  sensation  in 
the  house  ;  and,  by  the  time  the  front  door  could  be  open- 
ed, I  saw  Mrs.  Coleridge,  and  a  gentleman  whom  I  could 
not  duubt  to  be  Southey,  standing,  very  hospitably,  to 
greet  my  entrance.  Southey  was,  in  person,  somewhat 
taller  than  Wordsworth,  being  about  five  feet  eleven  in 
height,  or  a  trifle  more,  whilst  Wordsworth  was  about 
iive  feet  ten  ;  and,  partly  from  having  slender  limbs, 
partly  from  being  more  symmetrically  formed  about  the 
shoulders  than  Wordsworth,  he  struck  one  as  a  better 
and  lighter  figure,  to  the  efi"ect  of  which  his  dress  con- 


384 


LITERARY  REMII^ISCENCES. 


tributed  ;  for  lie  wore  pretty  constantly  a  short  jacket 
and  pantaloons,  and  had  much  the  air  of  a  Tyrolese 
mountaineer. 

On  the  next  day  arrived  Wordsworth.  I  could  read  at 
once,  in  the  manner  of  the  two  authors,  that  they  were 
not  on  particularly  friendly,  or  rather,  I  should  say,  confi- 
dential terms.  It  seemed  to  me  as  if  both  had  silently 
said  —  we  are  too  much  men  of  sense  to  quarrel,  because 
we  do  not  happen  particularly  to  like  each  other's  writ- 
ings :  we  are  neighbors,  or  what  passes  for  such  in  the 
country.  Let  us  show  each  other  the  courtesies  which 
are  becoming  to  men  of  letters ;  and,  for  any  closer  con- 
nection, our  distance  of  thirteen  miles  may  be  always 
sufficient  to  keep  us  from  that.  In  after  life,  it  is  true  — 
fifteen  years,  perhaps,  from  this  time  —  many  circumstan- 
ces combined  to  bring  Southey  and  Wordsworth  into  more 
intimate  terms  of  friendship  :  agreement  in  politics,  sor- 
rows which  had  happened  to  both  alike  in  their  domestic 
relations,  and  the  sort  of  tolerance  for  different  opinions 
in  literature,  or,  indeed,  in  anything  else,  which  advancing 
years  and  experience  are  sure  to  bring  with  them.  But 
at  this  period,  Southey  and  Wordsworth  entertained  a 
mutual  esteem,  but  did  not  cordially  like  each  other.  In- 
deed, it  would  have  been  odd  if  they  had.  Wordsworth 
lived  in  the  open  air:  Southey  in  his  library,  which  Coler- 
idge used  to  call  his  wife.  Southey  had  particularly  ele- 
gant habits  (Wordsworth  called  them  finical)  in  the  use  of 
books.  Wordsworth,  on  the  other  hand,  was  so  negligent, 
and  so  self-indulgent  in  the  same  case,  that  as  Southey, 
laughing,  expressed  it  to  me  some  years  afterwards,  when 
I  was  staying  at  Greta  Hall  on  a  visit  —  *  To  introduce 
Wordsworth  into  one's  library,  is  like  letting  a  bear  into  a 
tulip  garden.'  What  I  mean  by  self-indulgent  is  this : 
generally  it  happens  that  new  books  baffle  and  mock  one's 


WORDSWOKTH  AND  SOUTHEY.  385 

cariosity  by  their  uncut  leaves ;  and  the  trial  is  pretty 
much  the  same,  as  when,  in  some  town,  where  you  are 
utterly  unknown,  you  meet  the  postman  at  a  distance  from 
your  inn,  with  some  letter  for  yourself  from  a  dear,  dear 
friend  in  foreign  regions,  without  money  to  pay  the 
postage.  How  is  it  with  you,  dear  reader,  in  such  a  case  ? 
Are  you  not  tempted  (J  am  grievously)  to  snatch  the 
letter  from  his  tantalizing  hand,  spite  cf  the  roar  which 
you  anticipate  of  '  Stop  thief ! '  and  make  off  as  fast  as  you 
can  for  some  solitary  street  in  the  suburbs,  where  you 
may  instantly  effect  an  entrance  upon  your  new  estate 
before  the  purchase  money  is  paid  down  ?  Such  were 
Wordsworth's  feelings  in  regard  to  new  books ;  of  which 
the  first  exemplification  I  had  was  early  in  my  acquaint- 
ance with  him,  and  on  occasion  of  a  book  which  (if  any 
could)  justified  the  too  summary  style  of  his  advances  in 
rifling  its  charms.  On  a  level  with  the  eye,  when  sitting 
at  the  tea-table  in  my  little  cottage  at  Grasmere,  stood  the 
collective  works  of  Edmund  Burke.  The  book  was  to  me 
an  eye-sore  and  an  ear-sore  for  many  a  year,  in  conse- 
quence of  the  cacophonous  title  lettered  by  the  bookseller 
upon  the  back  — '  Burke's  Works.'  I  have  heard  it  said, 
by  the  way,  that  Donne's  intolerable  defect  of  ear,  grew 
out  of  his  own  baptismal  name,  when  harnessed  to  his 
own  surname  —  John  Donne,  No  man,  it  was  said,  who 
had  listened  to  this  hideous  jingle  from  childish  years, 
could  fail  to  have  his  genius  for  discord,  and  the  abomina- 
ble in  sound,  improved  to  the  utmost.  Not  less  dreadful 
than  John  Donne  was  '  Burke's  Works ; '  which,  however, 
on  the  old  principle,  that  every  day's  work  is  no  day's 
work,  continued  to  annoy  me  for  twenty-one  years. 
Wordsworth  took  down  the  volume ;  unfortunately  it 
was  uncut ;  fortunately,  and  by  a  special  Providence  as 
to  him,  it  seemed,  tea  was  proceeding  at  the  time.  Dry 
25 


886 


ilTEBAKY  KEMINISCENCES. 


toast  required  butter ;  butter  required  knives ;  and  knives 
then  lay  on  the  table ;  but  sad  it  was  for  the  virgin  purity 
of  Mr.  Burke' p  as  yet  unsunned  pages,  that  every  knife 
bore  upon  its  blade  testimonies  of  the  service  it  had  ren- 
dered. Did  that  stop  Wordsworth  ?  Did  that  cause  him 
to  call  for  another  knife  ?    Not  at  all ;  he 

*  Look'd  at  the  knife  that  caus'd  his  pain  : 
And  look'd  and  sigh*d,  and  look'd  and  sigh'd  again; ' 

and  then,  after  this  momentary  tribute  to  regret,  he  tore 
his  way  into  the  heart  of  the  volume  with  this  knife,  that 
left  its  greasy  honors  behind  it  upon  every  page :  and  are 
they  not  there  to  this  day?  This  personal  experience 
just  brought  me  acquainted  with  Wordsworth's  habits,  and 
that  particular,  especially,  with  his  intense  impatience  for 
one  minute's  delay,  which  would  have  brought  a  remedy ; 
and  yet  the  reader  may  believe  that  it  is  no  affectation  in 
me  to  say,  that  fifty  such  cases  could  have  given  me  but 
little  pain,  when  I  explain,  that  whatever  could  be  made 
good  by  money,  at  that  time,  I  did  not  regard.  Had  the 
book  been  an  old  black-letter  book,  having  a  value  from 
its  rarity,  I  should  have  been  disturbed  in  an  indescribable 
degree  ;  but  simply  with  reference  to  the  utter  impossi- 
bility of  reproducing  that  mode  of  value.  As  to  the 
Burke,  it  was  a  common  book ;  I  had  bought  the  book, 
with  many  others,  at  the  sale  of  Sir  Cecil  Wray's  library, 
for  about  two-thirds  of  the  selling  price :  I  could  easily 
replace  it ;  and  I  mention  the  case  at  all,  only  to  illustrate 
the  excess  of  Wordsworth's  outrages  on  books,  which 
made  him,  in  Southey's  eyes,  a  mere  monster ;  for 
Southey's  beautiful  library  was  his  estate ;  and  this  differ- 
ence of  habits  would  alone  have  sufficed  to  alienate  him 
from  Wordsworth.  And  so  I  argued  in  other  cases  of  the 
same  nature. 


WORDSWOKTH  AND  SOUTHEY. 


387 


Meantime,  had  Wordsworth  done  as  Coleridge  did,  how 
theerfuUy  should  I  have  acquiesced  in  his  destruction 
^such  as  it  was,  in  a  pecuniary  sense,)  of  books,  as  the 
very  highest  obligation  he  could  confer.  Coleridge  often 
spoiled  a  book ;  but,  in  the  course  of  doing  this,  he 
enriched  that  book  with  so  many  and  so  valuable  notes, 
tossing  about  him,  with  such  lavish  profusion,  from  such  a 
cornucopia  of  discursive  reading,  and  such  a  fusing 
intellect,  commentaries,  so  many-angled  and  so  many- 
colored,  that  I  have  envied  many  a  man  whose  luck  has 
placed  him  in  the  way  of  such  injuries ;  and  that  man 
must  have  been  a  churl  (though,  God  knows  !  too  often 
this  churl  has  existed)  who  could  have  found  in  his  heart 
to  complain.  But  Wordsworth  rarely,  indeed,  wrote  on 
the  margin  of  books;  and,  when  he  did,  nothing  could 
less  illustrate  his  intellectual  superiority.  The  comments 
were  such  as  might  have  been  made  by  anybody.  Once, 
I  remember,  before  I  had  ever  seen  Wordsworth  — 
probably  a  year  before  —  I  met  a  person  who  had  once 
enjoyed  the  signal  honor  of  travelling  with  him  to  London. 
It  was  in  a  stage-coach.  But  the  person  in  question  well 
knew  who  it  was  that  had  been  his  compagnon  de  voyage. 
Immediately  he  was  glorified  in  my  eyes.  '  And,'  said  I, 
to  this  glorified  gentleman,  (who,  par  parenthese,  was  also 
a  donkey,)  '  now,  as  you  travelled  nearly  three  hundred 
tniles  in  the  company  of  Mr.  Wordsworth,  consequently, 
^for  this  was  in  1805,)  during  two  nights  and  two  days, 
doubtless  you  must  have  heard  many  profound  remarks 
that  would  inevitably  fall  from  his  lips.'  Nay,  Coleridge 
had  also  been  of  the  party ;  and,  if  Wordsworth  solus 
could  have  been  dull,  was  it  within  human  possibilities 
that  these  gemini  should  have  been  so  ?  '  Was  it  pos- 
sible ? '  I  said ;  and,  perhaps,  my  donkey,  who  looked 
Uke  one  that  had  been  immoderately  threatened,  at  last 


388 


LITERABY  REMINISCENCES. 


took  courage  ;  his  eye  brightened  ;  and  he  intimated  that 
he  did  remember  something  that  Wordsworth  had  said  — 
an  '  observe/  as  the  Scotch  call  it. 

*  Ay,  indeed ;  and  what  was  it  now  ?  What  did  the 
great  man  say  ?  ' 

'  Why,  sir,  in  fact,  and  to  make  a  long  story  short,  on 
coming  near  to  London,  we  breakfasted  at  Baldock  — 
you  know  Baldock  ?  It's  in  Hertfordshire.  Well,  now, 
sir,  would  you  believe  it,  though  we  were  quite  in  regular 
time,  the  breakfast  was  precisely  good  for  nothing  ?  * 

'  And  Wordsworth  ?  ' 

'  He  observed  '  

'  What  did  he  observe  ?  ' 

'  That  the  buttered  toast  looked,  for  all  the  world,  as  if 
it  had  been  soaked  in  hot  water/ 

Ye  heavens !  '  buttered  toast  I '  And  was  it  tJiis  I 
waited  for  ?  Now,  thought  I,  had  Henry  Mackenzie  been 
breakfasting  with  Wordsworth,  at  Baldock,  (and,  strange 
enough !  in  years  to  come  I  did  breakfast  with  Henry 
Mackenzie,  for  the  solitary  time  I  ever  met  him,  and  at 
Wordsworth's  house,  in  Rydal,)  he  would  have  carried  off 
?)ne  sole  reminiscence  from  the  meeting  —  namely,  a 
confirmation  of  his  creed,  that  we  English  are  all  dedi- 
cated, from  our  very  cradle,  to  the  luxuries  of  the  palate, 
and  peculiarly  to  this.^'    Proh  pudor !    Yet,  in  sad  sin- 

*  It  is  not  known  to  the  English,  but  it  is  a  fact  which  I  can  vouch 
for,  from  my  six  or  seven  years'  residence  in  Scotland,  that  the 
Scotch,  one  and  all,  believe  it  to  be  an  inalienable  characteristic  of  an 
Englishman  to  be  fond  of  good  eating.  What  indignation  have  I, 
md  how  many  a  time,  had  occasion  to  feel  and  utter  on  this  subject  ? 
But  of  this  at  some  other  time.  Meantime,  the  Man  of  Feeling  had 
this  creed  in  excess  ;  and,  in  some  paper,  (of  Tlie  Mirror  or  Tht 
Lounger,)  he  describes  an  English  tourist  in  Scotland  by  saying  — 

I  would  not  wish  to  be  thought  national  ;  yet,  in  mere  reverence 
fcr  truth,  I  am  bound  to  say,  and  to  declare  to  all  the  world,  (let  whc 


"W  )RDSWORTH  AND  SOtJTHEY. 


389 


terity,  Wordswortli's  pencil-notices  in  book^  were  quite 
Ks  disappointing.  In  Roderick  Random,  for  example,  I 
found  a  note  upon  a  certain  luscious  description,  to  the 
effect  '  that  such  things  should  be  left  to  the  imagination 
of  the  reader —  not  expressed.'  In  another  place,  that  it 
was  '  improper  ;  '  and,  in  a  third,  *  that  the  principle  laid 
down  was  doubtful ; '  or,  as  Sir  Roger  de  Coverley  ob- 
serves, '  that  much  might  be  said  on  both  sides.'  All  this, 
however,  indicates  nothing  more  than  that  different  men 
require  to  be  roused  by  different  stimulants.  Wordsworth, 
in  his  marginal  notes,  thought  of  nothing  but  delivering 
himself  of  a  strong  feeling,  with  which  he  wished  to 
challenge  the  reader's  sympathy.  Coleridge  imagined  an 
audience  before  him ;  and,  however  doubtful  that  con- 
summation might  seem,  I  am  satisfied  that  he  never  wrote 
a  line  for  which  he  did  not  feel  the  momentary  inspiration 
of  sympathy  and  applause,  under  the  confidence,  that, 
sooner  or  later,  all  which  he  had  committed  to  the  chance 
margins  of  books  would  converge  and  assemble  in  some 
common  reservoir  of  reception.  Bread  scattered  upon 
the  water  will  be  gathered  after  many  days.  This,  per- 
haps, was  the  consolation  that  supported  him ;  and  the 
prospect  that,  for  a  time,  his  Arethusa  of  truth  would  flow 
underground,  did  not,  perhaps,  disturb,  but  rather  cheered 
and  elevated  the  sublime  old  somnabulist."^* 

Meantime,  Wordsworth's  habits  of  using  books  —  which, 

will  be  offended,)  that  the  first  innkeeper  in  Scotland,  under  whose 
roof  we  met  with  genuine  buttered  toast,  was  an  Englishman.* 

*  Meantime,  if  it  did  not  disturb  /im,  it  ought  to  disturb  ws,  his 
immediate  successors,  who  are  at  once  the  most  likely  to  retrieve  these 
osses  by  direct  efforts,  and  the  least  likely  to  benefit  by  any  casual 
ur  indirect  retrievals,  such  as  wiL  be  produced  by  time.  Surely  a 
Bubscription  should  be  set  on  foot  to  recover  all  books  enriched  by 
bis  marginal  notes.  I  would  subscribe;  and  I  know  others  whf 
^ouli  largely. 


§90 


LITERAEY  REMINISCENCES. 


I  am  satisfied,  would,  in  those  days,  alone  have  kept  him 
at  a  distance  from  most  men  with  fine  libraries  —  were 
not  vulgar ;  not  the  habits  of  those  who  turn  over  the 
page  by  means  of  a  wet  finger,  (though  even  this  abom- 
ination I  have  seen  perpetrated  by  a  Cambridge  tutor  and 
fellow  of  a  college  ;  but  then  he  had  been  bred  up  as  a 
ploughman,  and  the  son  of  a  ploughman ;)  no  ;  but  his 
habits  were  more  properly  barbarous  and  licentious,  and 
in  the  spirit  of  audacity  belonging  de  jure  to  no  man  but 
him  who  could  plead  an  income  of  four  or  five  hundred 
thousand  per  annum,  and  to  whom  the  Bodleian  or  the 
Vatican  would  be  a  three  years'  purchase.  Gross,  mean- 
time, was  his  delusion  upon  this  subject.  Himself  he 
regarded  as  the  golden  mean  between  the  too  little  and 
the  too  much  of  care  for  books  ;  and,  as  it  happened  that 
every  one  of  his  friends  far  exceeded  him  in  this  point, 
curiously  felicitous  was  the  explanation  which  he  gave  of 
this  superfluous  care,  so  as  to  bring  it  within  the  natural 
operation  of  some  known  fact  in  the  man's  peculiar 
situation.  Southey  (he  was  by  nature  something  of  an 
old  bachelor)  had  his  house  filled  with  pretty  articles  — 
bijouterie,  and  so  forth ;  and,  naturally,  he  wished  his 
books  to  be  kept  up  to  the  same  level  —  burnished  and 
bright  for  show.  Sir  George  Beaumont  —  this  peculiarly 
elegant  and  accomplished  man  —  was  an  old  and  most 
iff*ectionate  friend  of  Wordsworth's.  Sir  George  Beau- 
mont never  had  any  children  ;  if  he  had  been  so  blessed, 
they,  by  familiarizing  him  with  the  spectacle  of  books  ill 
used  —  stained,  torn,  mutilated,  &c.  —  would  have  low- 
ered the  standard  of  his  requisitions.  The  short  solution 
of  the  whole  case  was  —  and  it  illustrated  the  nature  oi 
ais  education  —  he  had  never  lived  in  a  regular  family  at 
d  time  when  habits  are  moulded.  From  boyhood  ta 
manhood  he  had  been  sui  juris. 


WORDSWOHTH  AND  SOUTHET. 


391 


Returning  to  Southey  and  Greta  Hall,  both  the  house 
and  the  master  may  deserve  a  few  words  more  of  de- 
scription. For  the  master,  I  have  already  sketched  hia 
person ;  and  his  face  I  profess  myself  unable  to  describe 
accurately.  His  hair  was  black,  and  yet  his  complexion 
was  fair ;  his  eyes  I  believe  to  be  hazel  and  large  ;  but  I 
will  not  vouch  for  that  fact :  his  nose  aquiline ;  and  he 
has  a  remarkable  habit  of  looking  up  into  the  air,  as  if 
looking  at  abstractions.  The  expression  of  his  face  was 
that  of  a  very  acute  and  an  aspiring  man.  So  far,  it 
was  even  noble,  as  it  conveyed  a  feeling  of  a  serene  and 
gentle  pride,  habitually  familiar  with  elevating  subjects  of 
contemplation.  And  yet  it  was  impossible  that  this  pride 
could  have  been  offensive  to  anybody,  chastened  as  if 
was  by  the  most  unaffected  modesty  ;  and  this  modesty 
made  evident  and  prominent  by  the  constant  expression  of 
reverence  for  the  great  men  of  the  age,  (when  he  hap- 
pened to  esteem  them  such,)  and  for  all  the  great  patriarchs 
of  our  literature.  The  point  in  which  Southey's  manner 
failed  the  most  in  conciliating  regard,  was,  in  all  which 
related  to  the  external  expressions  of  friendliness.  No 
man  could  be  more  sincerely  hospitable  —  no  man  more 
essentially  disposed  to  give  up  even  his  time  (the  posses- 
sion which  he  most  valued)  to  the  service  of  his  friends. 
But  there  was  an  air  of  reserve  and  distance  about  him  — 
the  reserve  of  a  lofty,  self-respecting  mind,  but,  perhaps, 
a  little  too  freezing  —  in  his  treatment  of  all  persons  who 
were  not  among  the  corps  of  his  ancient  fireside  friends. 
Still,  even  towards  the  veriest  strangers,  it  is  but  justice 
to  notice  his  extreme  courtesy  in  sacrificing  his  literary 
Bmployments  for  the  day,  whatever  they  might  be,  to  the 
duty  (for  such  he  made  it)  of  doing  the  honors  of  the 
^ake,  and  the  adjacent  mountains. 

Southey  was  at  that  time,  (1807,)  and  has  continued 


392 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


ever  since,  the  most  industrious  of  all  literary  men  on 
record.  A  certain  task  he  prescribed  to  himself  every 
morning  before  breakfast.  This  could  not  be  a  very  long 
one,  for  he  breakfasted  at  nine,  or  soon  after,  and  never 
rose  before  eight,  though  he  went  to  bed  duly  at  half- past 
ten ;  but,  as  I  have  many  times  heard  him  say,  less  than 
nine  hours'  sleep  he  found  insufficient.  From  breakfast 
to  a  latish  dinner  (about  half  after  five  or  six)  was  his 
main  period  of  literary  toil.  After  dinner,  according  to 
the  accident  of  having  or  not  having  visitors  in  the  house, 
he  sat  over  his  wine  ;  or  he  retired  to  his  library  again, 
from  which,  about  eight,  he  was  summoned  to  tea.  But, 
generally  speaking,  he  closed  his  literary  toils  at  dinner  ; 
the  whole  of  the  hours  after  that  meal  being  dedicated  to 
his  correspondence.  This,  it  may  be  supposed,  was 
unusually  large,  to  occupy  so  much  of  his  time,  for  his 
letters  rarely  extended  to  any  length.  At  that  period,  the 
post,  by  way  of  Penrith,  reached  Keswick  about  six  or 
seven  in  the  evening.  And  so  pointedly  regular  was 
Southey  in  all  his  habits,  that,  short  as  the  time  was,  all 
letters  were  answered  on  the  same  evening  which  brought 
them.  At  tea,  he  read  the  London  papers.  It  was  per- 
fectly astonishing  to  men  of  less  methodical  habits,  to  find 
how  much  he  got  through  of  elaborate  business  by  his 
unvarying  system  of  arrangement  in  the  distribution  of 
his  time.  We  often  hear  it  said,  in  accounts  of  pattern 
ladies  and  gentlemen,  (what  Coleridge  used  contemptu- 
ously to  style  goody  people,)  that  they  found  time  for 
everything ;  that  business  never  interrupted  pleasure ; 
\hat  labors  of  love  and  charity  never  stood  in  the  way  of 
courtesy  and  personal  enjoyment.  This  is  easy  to  say  — 
easy  to  put  down  as  one  feature  of  an  imaginary  portrait : 
but  I  must  say,  that,  in  actual  life,  I  have  seen  few  such 
cases.    Southey,  however,  did  find  time  for  everything. 


WORDSWORTH  AND  SOUTHEY. 


393 


\  It  moved  the  sneers  of  some  people,  that  even  his  poetry 
was  composed  according  to  a  predetermined  rule  ;  that  so 
many  lines  should  be  produced,  by  contract,  as  it  were, 
before  breakfast ;  so  many  at  such  another  definite  inter- 
val. And  I  acknowledge,  that,  so  far,  I  went  along  with 
the  sneerers,  as  to  n.arvel  exceedingly  how  that  could  be 
possible.  But,  if  d  priori,  one  laughed  and  expected  to 
see  verses  corresponding  to  this  mechanic  rule  of  con- 
struction, d  posteriori  one  was  bound  to  judge  of  the 
verses  as  one  found  them.  Supposing  them  good,  they 
were  entitled  to  honor,  no  matter  for  the  previous  reasons 
which  made  it  possible  that  they  would  not  be  good.  And 
generally,  however  undoubtedly  they  ought  to  have  been 
bad,  the  world  has  pronounced  them  good.  In  fact,  they 
are  good  ;  and  the  sole  objection  to  them  is,  that  they  are 
too  intensely  objective  —  too  much  reflect  the  mind,  as 
spreading  itself  out  upon  external  things  —  too  little  ex- 
hibit the  mind,  as  introverting  itself  upon  its  own  thoughts 
and  feelings.  This,  however,  is  an  objection,  which  only 
seems  to  limit  the  range  of  the  poetry  —  and  all  poetry 
is  limited  in  its  range  :  none  comprehends  more  than  a 
section  of  the  human  power.  Meantime,  the  prose  of 
Southey  was  that  by  which  he  lived.  The  Quarterly 
Review  it  was  by  which,  as  he  expressed  it  to  myself  in 
1810,  he  *  made  the  pot  boil,' 

About  the  same  time,  possibly  as  early  as  1808,  (for 
I  think  that  I  remember  in  that  Journal  an  account  of  the 
Battle  of  Vimiera,)  Southey  was  engaged  by  an  Edin- 
burgh publisher,  [Constable,  w^as  it  not?]  to  write  the 
entire  historical  part  of  The  Edinburgh  Annual  Register, 
at  a  salary  of  £400  per  annum.  Afterwards,  the  pub- 
Visher,  who  was  intensely  national,  and,  doubtless,  never 
from  the  first  cordially  relished  the  notion  of  importing 
English  aid  intc3  a  city  teeming  with  briefless  barristers 


394 


LITEKART  REMINISCENCES. 


and  variety  of  talent,  threw  out  a  hint  that  perhaps  he 
might  reduce  the  salary  to  £300.  Just  about  this  time  I 
happened  to  see  Southey,  who  said  laughingly  —  *  If  the 
man  of  Edinburgh  does  this,  I  shall  strike  for  an  advance 
of  wages.'  I  presume  that  he  did  strike,  and,  like  many 
other  *  operatives/  withou'.  effect.  Those  who  work  for 
lower  wages  during  a  strike  are  called  snobs,*  the  men 
who  stand  out  being  nobs,  Southey  became  a  resolute 
nob  ;  but  some  snob  was  found  in  Edinburgh,  some  youth- 
ful advocate,  who  accepted  £300  per  annum,  and  thence- 
forward Southey  lost  this  part  of  his  income.  I  once 
possessed  the  whole  work  :  and  in  one  part,  viz.  The  Do* 
mestic  Chronicle,  I  know  that  it  is  executed  with  a  most 
culpable  carelessness  —  the  beginnings  of  cases  being 
given  without  the  ends,  the  ends  without  the  beginnings 
—  a  defect  but  too  common  in  public  journals.  The  credit 
of  the  work,  however,  was  staked  upon  its  treatment  of 
the  current  public  history  of  Europe,  and  the  tone  of  its 
politics  in  times  so  full  of  agitation,  and  teeming  with  new 
births  in  every  year,  some  fated  to  prove  abortive,  but 
others  bearing  golden  promises  for  the  human  race.  Now, 
whatever  might  be  the  talent  with  which  Southey' s  suc- 
cessor performed  his  duty,  there  was  a  loss  in  one  point 
for  which  no  talent  of  mere  execution  could  make  amends. 
The  very  prejudices  of  Southey  tended  to  unity  of  feeling : 
they  were  in  harmony  with  each  other,  and  grew  out  of  a 
strong  moral  feeling,  which  is  the  one  sole  secret  for 
giving  interest  to  an  historical  narration,  fusing  the  inco- 
herent details  into  one  body,  and  carrying  the  reader 
fluently  along  the  else  monotonous  recurrences  and  un- 
meaning details  of  military  movements.  Well  or  ili 
directed,  a  strong  moral  feeling,  and  a  profound  sympathy 


♦  See  the  Evidence  before  the  House  of  Commons'  Committee. 


WOUDSWORTH  AND  SOUTHET. 


395 


with  elementary  justice,  is  that  which  creates  a  soul  under 
what  else  may  well  he  denominated,  Miltonically,  *  the 
ribs  of  death.' 

Now  this,  and  a  mind  already  made  up  even  to  obsti- 
nacy upon  all  public  questions,  were  the  peculiar  qualifi- 
cations which  Southey  brought  to  the  task  —  qualifications 
not  to  be  bought  in  any  market,  not  to  be  compensated  by 
any  amount  of  mere  intellectual  talent,  and  almost  impos- 
sible as  the  qualifications  of  a  much  younger  man.  As  a 
pecuniary  loss,  though  considerable,  Southey  was  not  un- 
able to  support  it ;  for  he  had  a  pension  from  Governmen 
before  this  time,  and  under  the  following  circumstances  : 
—  Charles  Wynne,  the  brother  of  Sir  Watkin,  the  great 
autocrat  of  North  Wales  —  that  C.  W.  who  is  almost 
equally  well  known  for  his  knowledge  of  Parliamentary 
usage,  which  pointed  him  out  to  the  notice  of  the  House 
as  an  eligible  person  to  fill  the  office  of  speaker,  and  for 
his  unfortunately  shrill  voice,  which  chiefly  it  was  that 
defeated  his  claim  ^' —  (in  fact,  as  is  universally  known,  his 
brother  and  he,  for  different  defects  of  voice  and  utterance, 
are  called  Bubble  and  Squeak)  —  this  C.  W.  had  believed 
himself  to  have  been  deeply  indebted  to  Southey's  high- 
toned  moral  example,  and  to  his  wise  counsels,  during  the 
time  when  both  were  students  at  Oxford,  for  the  fortunate 
direction  given  to  his  own  wavering  impulses.  This  sense 
of  obligation  he  endeavored  to  express,  by  settling  a  pen- 
Mon  upon  Southey  from  his  own  funds.  At  length,  upon 
the  death  of  Mr.  Pitt,  early  in  1806,  an  opening  was  made 
for  the  Fox  and  Grenville  parties  to  come  into  office. 

*  Sir  Watkin,  the  elder  brother,  had  a  tongue  too  large  for  his 
mouth;  Mr.  C.  Wynne,  the  younger,  had  a  shrill  voice,  which  at 
times  rose  into  a  scream.  It  became,  therefore,  a  natural  and  cur- 
rent jest,  to  call  the  two  brothers  by  the  name  of  a  well-known  dish^ 
viz.  bubble  and  squeak. 


596 


LITERAEY  REMINISCENCES. 


Charles  Wynne,  as  a  person  connected  by  marriage  with 
the  house  of  Grenville,  and  united  with  them  in  political 
opinions,  shared  in  the  golden  shower  ;  he  also  received  a 
place  ;  and,  upon  the  strength  of  his  improving  prospects, 
he  married  :  upon  which  it  occurred  to  Southey,  that  it 
was  no  longer  right  to  tax  the  funds  of  one  who  was  now 
called  upon  to  support  an  establishment  becoming  his 
rank.  Under  that  impression  he  threw  up  his  pension ; 
and  upon  their  part,  to  express  their  sense  of  what  they 
considered  a  delicate  and  honorable  sacrifice,  the  Gren 
villes  placed  Southey  upon  the  national  pension  list. 

What  might  be  the  exact  color  of  Southey's  political 
creed  in  this  year,  1807,  it  is  difficult  to  say.  The  great 
revolution,  in  his  way  of  thinking  upon  such  subjects, 
with  which  he  has  been  so  often  upbraided  as  something 
equal  in  delinquency  to  a  deliberate  tergiversation  or 
moral  apostasy,  could  not  have  then  taken  place  ;  and  of 
this  I  am  sure,  from  the  following  little  anecdote  connected 
with  this  visit :  —  On  the  day  after  my  own  arrival  at 
Greta  Hall,  came  Wordsworth  following  upon  my  steps 
from  Penrith.  We  dined  and  passed  that  evening  with 
Mr.  Southey.  The  next  morning,  after  breakfast,  pre- 
viously to  leaving  Keswick,  we  were  sitting  in  Southey's 
library ;  and  he  was  discussing  with  Wordsworth  the 
aspect  of  public  affairs  :  for  my  part,  I  was  far  too  diffi- 
dent to  take  any  part  in  such  a  conversation,  for  I  had  no 
opinions  at  all  upon  politics,  nor  any  interest  in  public 
affairs,  further  than  that  I  had  a  keen  sympathy  with  the 
national  honor,  gloried  in  the  name  of  Englishman,  and 
had  been  bred  up  in  a  frenzied  horror  of  jacobinism.  Not 
having  been  old  enough,  at  the  first  outbreak  of  the 
French  Revolution,  to  participate  (as  else,  undoubtedly,  1 
nhould  have  done)  in  the  golden  hopes  of  its  early  dawn, 
*ny  first  youthful  introduction  to  foreign  politics  had  been 


WOTIDSWOBTH  AND  SOUTHEY. 


897 


n  seasons  and  circumstances  that  taught  me  to  approve 
of  all  I  heard  in  abhorrence  of  French  excesses,  and  to 
worship  the  name  of  Pitt ;  otherwise  my  whole  heart  had 
been  so  steadily  fixed  on  a  different  world  from  the  world 
of  our  daily  experience,  that,  for  some  years,  I  had  never 
looked  into  a  newspaper  ;  nor,  if  I  cared  something  for  the 
movement  made  by  nations  from  year  to  year,  did  I  care 
one  iota  for  their  movement  from  week  to  week.  Still, 
careless  as  I  was  on  these  subjects,  it  sounded  as  a  novelty 
to  me,  and  one  which  I  had  net  dreamed  of  as  a  possibil- 
ity, to  hear  men  of  education  and  liberal  pursuits  —  men, 
besides,  whom  I  regarded  as  so  elevated  in  mind,  and  one 
of  them  as  a  person  charmed  and  consecrated  from  error 
—  giving  utterance  to  sentiments  which  seemed  absolutely 
disloyal.  Yet  now  did  I  hear — and  I  heard  with  an 
emotion  of  sorrow,  but  a  sorrow  that  instantly  gave  way 
to  a  conviction  that  it  was  myself  who  lay  under  a  delu- 
sion, and  simply  because 

 *  from  Abelard  it  came '  — 

opinions  avowed  most  hostile  to  the  reigning  family ;  not 
personally  to  them,  but  generally  to  a  monarchical  form 
of  government.  And  that  I  could  not  be  mistaken  in  my 
impression,  that  my  memory  cannot  have  played  me  false, 
is  evident,  from  one  relic  of  the  conversation  which  rested 
upon  my  ear,  and  has  survived  to  this  day  —  thirty  and 
two  years  from  the  time."^  It  had  been  agreed,  that  no 
g-ood  was  to  be  hoped  for,  as  respected  England,  until  the 
royal  family  should  be  expatriated;  and  Southey,  jestingly 
considering  to  what  country  they  could  be  exiled,  with 
mutual  benefit  for  that  country  and  themselves,  had  sup- 
posed the  case  —  that,  with  a  large  allowance  of  money, 

♦  Thirty-two  years,  observe,  at  the  time  when  these  parts  wcrt 
written  ;  but  that  time  was  at  least  fifteen  years  ago. 


898 


LITEHARY  KEMINISCENCES. 


Buch  as  might  stimulate  beneficially  the  industry  of  a  rising 
colony,  they  should  be  transported  to  New  South  Wales ; 
which  project,  amusing  his  fancy,  he  had,  with  the  readi- 
ness and  facility  that  characterizes  his  mind,  thrown  ex- 
tempore into  verse  ;  speaking  ofi",  as  an  improvisatore, 
about  eight  or  ten  lines,  of  which  the  three  last  I  perfectly 
remember,  and  they  were  these,  (by  the  way  I  should 
have  mentioned,  that  they  took  the  form  of  a  petition 
addressed  to  the  King  : )  — 

'  Therefore,  old  George,  by  George  we  pray 
Of  thee  forthwith  to  extend  thy  sway 
Over  the  great  Botanic  Bay.' 

The  sole  doubt  I  have  about  the  exact  words  regard  the 
second  line,  which  might  have  been  (according  to  a  various 
reading  which  equally  clings  to  my  ear)  — 

•  That  thou  would*st  please  t'  extend  thy  sway.' 

But  about  the  last  I  cannot  be  wrong ;  for  I  remembei 
laughing  with  a  sense  of  something  peculiarly  droll  in  the 
substitution  of  the  stilted  phrase  — '  the  great  Botanic  Bay^ 
for  our  ordinary  week-day  name  Botany  Bay^  so  redolent 
of  thieves  and  pickpockets. 

Southey  walked  with  us  that  morning  for  about  five 
miles  on  our  road  towards  Grasmere,  which  brought  us  to 
the  southern  side  of  Shoulthwaite  Moss,  and  into  the 
sweet  solitary  little,  vale  of  Legbesthwaite.  And,  by  the 
way,  he  took  leave  of  us  at  the  gate  of  a  house,  one 
amongst  the  very  few  (five  or  six  in  all)  just  serving  to 
redeem  that  valley  from  absolute  solitude,  which  some 
years  afterwards  became,  in  a  slight  degree,  remarkable 
to  me  from  two  little  incidents  by  which  it  connected 
itself  with  my  personal  experiences.  One  was,  perhaps, 
scarcely  worth  recording.  It  was  simply  this  —  that 
Wordsworth  and  myself  having,  through  a  long  day'a 


WORDSWORTH  AND  SOUTHET. 


399 


rambling,  alternately  walked  and  rode  with  a  friend  of 
his  who  happened  to  have  a  traveling  carriage  with  him, 
and  who  was  on  his  way  to  Keswick,  agreed  to  wait 
hereabouts  until  Wordsworth's  friend,  in  his  abundant 
kindness,  should  send  back  his  carriage  to  take  us,  on  our 
return  to  Grasmere,  distant  about  eight  miles.  It  was  a 
lovely  summer  evening ;  but,  as  it  happened  that  we 
ate  our  breakfast  early,  and  had  eaten  nothing  at  all 
throughout  a  long  summer's  day,  we  agreed  to  '  sorn ' 
upon  the  goodman  of  the  house,  whoever  he  might  happen 
to  be,  Catholic  or  Protestant,  Jew,  Gtntile,  or  Mahometan, 
and  to  take  any  bone  that  he  would  be  pleased  to  toss  to 
such  hungry  dogs  as  ourselves.  Accordingly  we  repaired 
to  his  gate  ;  we  knocked,  and,  forthwith  it  was  opened  to 
us  by  a  man-mountain,  who  listened  benignantly  to  our 
humble  request,  and  ushered  us  into  a  comfortable  parlor. 
All  sorts  of  refreshments  he  continued  to  shower  upon  us 
for  a  space  of  two  hours  :  it  became  evident  that  our 
introducer  was  the  master  of  the  house  :  we  adored  him  in 
our  thoughts  as  an  earthly  providence  to  hungry  way- 
farers ;  and  we  longed  to  make  his  acquaintance.  But, 
for  some  inexplicable  reason,  that  must  continue  to  puzzle 
all  future  commentators  on  Wordsworth  and  his  history, 
he  never  made  his  appearance.  Could  it  be,  we  thought, 
that,  without  the  formality  of  a  sign,  he,  in  so  solitary  a 
region,  more  than  twenty-five  miles  distant  from  Kendal, 
(the  only  town  worthy  of  the  name  throughout  the  adjacent 
country,)  exercised  the  functions  of  a  landlord,  and  that 
we  ought  to  pay  him  for  his  most  liberal  hospitality  ? 
Never  was  such  a  dilemma  from  the  foundation  of 
Legbesthwaite.  To  err,  either  direction,  was  damna- 
ble :  to  go  off  without  paying,  if  he  were  an  innkeeper, 
made  us  swindlers  ;  to  offer  payment  if  he  were  not,  and 
tupposing  that  he  had  been  inundating  us  with  his  hospit* 


400 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


able  bounties,  simply  in  the  character  of  a  natural -born 
gentleman,  made  us  tbe  most  unfeeling  of  mercenary 
ruffians.  In  the  latter  case  we  might  expect  a  duel ;  in 
the  former,  of  course,  the  treadmill.  We  were  deliberat- 
ing on  this  sad  alternative,  and  I,  for  my  part  was  voting 
in  favor  of  the  treadmill,  when  the  sound  of  wheels  was 
heard,  and,  in  one  minute,  the  carriage  of  his  friend  drew 
up  to  the  farmer's  gate  ;  the  crisis  had  now  arrived,  and 
we  perspired  considerably ;  when  in  came  the  frank 
Cumberland  lass  who  had  been  our  attendant.  To  hex 
we  propounded  our  difficulty  —  and  lucky  it  was  we  did 
so,  for  she  assured  us  that  her  master  was  an  awful  man, 
and  would  have  '  brained  '  us  both  if  we  had  insulted  him 
with  the  offer  of  money.  She,  however,  honored  us  by 
accepting  the  price  of  some  female  ornament. 

I  made  a  memorandum  at  the  time,  to  ascertain  the 
peculiar  taste  of  this  worthy  Cumberland  farmer,  in  order 
that  I  might,  at  some  future  opportunity,  express  my  thanks 
to  him  for  his  courtesy ;  but,  alas  !  for  human  resolutions, 
I  have  not  done  so  to  this  moment ;  and  is  it  likely  that 
he,  perhaps  sixty  years  old  at  that  time,  (1813,)  is  alive  at 
present,  twenty-five  years  removed  ?  Well,  he  may  be  ; 
though  I  think  that  exceedingly  doubtful,  considering  the 
next  anecdote  relating  to  the  same  house  :  —  Two,  or,  it 
may  be,  three  years  after  this  time,  I  was  walking  to  Kes- 
wick, from  my  own  cottage,  in  Grasmere.  The  distance 
was  thirteen  miles  ;  the  time  just  nine  o'clock  ;  the  night 
a  cloudy  moonlight,  and  intensely  cold.  I  took  the  very 
greatest  delight  in  these  nocturnal  walks,  through  the 
silent  valleys  of  Cumberland  and  Westmoreland ;  and 
often  at  hours  far  later  than  the  present.  What  I  liked  in 
this  solitary  rambling  was,  to  trace  the  course  of  the  even- 
ing through  its  household  hieroglyphics,  from  the  windows 
vhich  I  passed  or  saw ;  to  see  the  blazing  fires  shining 


TrOKDSWORTH  AND  SOXTTHET.  401 

through  the  windows  of  houses,  lurking  in  nooks  far  apart 
from  neighbors ;  sometimes  in  solitudes  that  seemed 
abandoned  to  the  owl,  to  catch  the  sounds  of  household 
mirth  ;  then,  some  miles  further,  to  perceive  the  time  of 
going  to  bed  ;  then  the  gradual  sinking  to  silence  of  the 
bouse  ;  then  the  drowsy  reign  of  the  cricket ;  at  intervals, 
to  hear  church-clocks  or  a  little  solitary  chapel-bell,  under 
the  brows  of  mighty  hills,  proclaiming  the  hours  of  the 
night,  and  flinging  out  their  sullen  knells  over  the  graves 
where  '  the  rude  forefathers  of  the  hamlet  slept '  —  where 
the  strength  and  the  loveliness  of  Elizabeth's  time,  or 
Cromwell's,  and  through  so  many  fleeting  generations 
that  have  succeeded,  had  long  ago  sunk  to  rest.  Such 
was  the  sort  of  pleasure  which  I  reaped  in  my  nightly 
walks  —  of  which,  however,  considering  the  suspicions  of 
lunacy  which  it  has  sometimes  awoke,  the  less  I  say,  per- 
haps, the  better.  Nine  o'clock  it  was  —  and  deadly  cold 
as  ever  March  night  was  made  by  the  keenest  of  black 
frosts,  and  by  the  bitterest  of  north  winds  —  when  I  drew 
towards  the  gate  of  our  huge  and  hospitable  friend.  A 
little  garden  there  was  before  the  house ;  and  in  the 
centre  of  this  garden  was  placed  an  arm-chair,  upon  which 
arm-chair  was  sitting  composedly  —  but  I  rubbed  my  eyes, 
doubting  the  very  evidence  of  my  own  eyesight  —  a  or  the 
huge  man  in  his  shirt- sleeves  ;  yes,  positively  not  sunning 
but  mooning  himself  —  apricating  himself  in  the  occasional 
moonbeams  ;  and,  as  if  simple  star-gazing  from  a  seden- 
tary station  were  not  suflicient  on  such  a  night,  absolutely 
pursuing  his  astrological  studies,  I  repeat,  in  his  shirt- 
sleeves !  Could  this  be  our  hospitable  friend,  the  man- 
mountain  ?  Secondly,  was  it  any  man  at  all  ?  Might  it 
not  be  a  scarecrow  dressed  up  to  frighten  the  birds  ?  But 
from  what  —  to  frignten  them  from  what  at  that  season 
if  the  year  ?  Yet^  again,  it  might  be  an  ancient  scare- 
26 


402 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


crow  —  a  superannuated  scarecrow,  far  advanced  in  years. 
But,  still,  why  should  a  scarecrow,  young  or  old,  sit  in  an 
arm  -chair  ?  Suppose  I  were  to  ask.  Yet,  where  was  the 
use  of  asking  a  scarecrow  ?  And,  if  not  a  scarecrow, 
where  was  the  safety  of  speaking  too  inquisitively,  on  his 
own  premises,  to  a  man-mountain  ?  The  old  dilemma  of 
the  duel  or  the  treadmill,  if  I  should  intrude  upon  his 
grounds  at  night,  occurred  to  me ;  and  I  watched  the 
anomalous  object  in  silence  for  some  minutes.  At  length 
the  monster  (for  such  at  any  rate  it  was,  scarecrow  or  not 
scarecrow)  solemnly  raised  his  hand  to  his  face,  perhaps 
taking  a  pinch  of  snuff,  and  thereby  settled  one  question. 
But  that  settled,  only  irritated  my  curiosity  the  more  ; 
upon  a  second,  what  hallucination  of  the  brain  was  it  that 
could  induce  a  living  man  to  adopt  so  very  absurd  a  line 
of  conduct  ?  Once  I  thought  of  addressing  him  thus  :  — 
Might  I  presume  so  far  upon  your  known  courtesy  to  way- 
faring strangers,  as  to  ask  —  Is  it  the  Devil  who  prompts 
you  to  sit  in  your  shirt-sleeves,  as  if  meditating  a  camisade, 
or  to  woo  al  fresco  pleasures  on  such  a  night  as  this  ? 
But  as  Dr.  Y.,  on  complaining  that,  whenever  he  looked 
out  of  the  window,  he  was  sure  to  see  Mr.  X.  lounging 
about  the  quadrangle,  was  effectually  parried  by  Mr.  X. 
retorting  —  that,  whenever  he  lounged  in  the  quadrangle, 
he  was  sure  to  see  the  Doctor  looking  out  of  the  window ; 
so  did  I  anticipate  a  puzzling  rejoinder  from  the  former, 
with  regard  to  my  own  motives  for  haunting  the  roads  as 
a  nocturnal  tramper,  without  a  rational  object  that  I 
could  make  intelligible.  I  thought,  also,  of  the  fate  which 
attended  the  Calendars,  and  so  many  other  notorious  char- 
acters in  the  '  Arabian  Nights,'  for  unseasonable  ques- 
tions,  or  curiosity  too  vivacious.  And,  upon  the  whole,  I 
judged  it  advisable  to  pursue  my  journey  in  silence,  con- 
sidering the  time  of  night,  the  solitary  place,  and  the 


WORDSWORTH  AND  SOUTHEY. 


403 


fancy  of  our  enormous  friend  for  '  braining '  those  whom 
he  regarded  as  ugly  customers.  And  thus  it  came  about 
that  this  one  house  has  been  loaded  in  my  memory  with  a 
double  mystery,  that  too  probably  never  can  be  explained : 
and  another  torment  had  been  prepared  for  the  curious 
of  future  ages. 

Of  Southey,  meantime,  I  had  learned,  upon  this  brief 
and  hurried  visit,  so  much  in  confirmation  or  in  extension 
of  my  tolerably  just  preconceptions,  with  regard  to  his 
character  and  manners,  as  left  me  not  a  very  great  deal 
to  add,  and  nothing  at  all  to  alter,  through  the  many  years 
which  followed  of  occasional  intercourse  with  his  family, 
and  domestic  knowledge  of  his  habits.  A  man  of  more 
serene  and  even  temper,  could  not  be  imagined  ;  nor  more 
uniformly  cheerful  in  his  tone  of  spirits  ;  nor  more  unaf- 
fectedly polite  and  courteous  in  his  demeanor  to  strangers  ; 
nor  more  hospitable  in  his  own  wrong  —  I  mean  by  the 
painful  sacrifices,  which  hospitality  entailed  upon  him,  of 
time,  so  exceedingly  precious  that,  during  his  winter  and 
spring  months  of  solitude,  or  whenever  he  was  left  abso- 
lute master  of  its  distribution,  every  half  hour  in  the  day 
had  its  peculiar  duty.  In  the  still  '  weightier  matters  of 
the  law,*  in  cases  that  involved  appeals  to  conscience  and 
high  moral  principle,  I  believe  Southey  to  be  as  exemplary 
a  man  as  can  ever  have  lived.  Were  it  to  his  own  instant 
ruin,  I  am  satisfied  that  he  would  do  justice  and  fulfil  his 
duty  under  any  possible  difficulties,  and  through  the  very 
strongest  temptations  to  do  otherwise.  For  honor  the 
most  delicate,  for  integrity  the  firmest,  and  for  generosity 
within  the  limits  of  prudence,  Southey  cannot  well  have 
a  superior  ;  and,  in  the  lesser  moralities  —  those  which 
govern  the  daily  habits,  and  transpire  through  the  manners 
~  he  is  certainly  a  better  man  —  that  is,  (with  reference 


m 


LITERAKY  REMINISCENCES. 


to  the  minor  principle  concerned,)  a  more  amiable  man  — 
than  Wordsworth.  He  is  less  capable,  for  instance,  of 
usurping  an  undue  share  of  the  conversation ;  he  is  more 
uniformly  disposed  to  be  charitable  in  his  transient  collo- 
quial judgments  upon  doubtful  actions  of  his  neighbors; 
more  gentle  and  winning  in  his  condescensions  to  inferior 
knowledge  or  powers  of  mind  ;  more  willing  to  suppose  it 
possible  that  he  himself  may  have  fallen  into  an  error ; 
more  tolerant  of  avowed  indifference  towards  his  own 
writings,  (though  by  the  way,  I  shall  have  something  to 
offer  in  justification  of  Wordsworth,  upon  this  charge ;) 
and,  finally,  if  the  reader  will  pardon  a  violent  instance 
of  anti-climax,  much  more  ready  to  volunteer  his  assist- 
ance in  carrying  a  lady's  reticule  or  parasol. 

As  a  more  amiable  man,  (taking  that  word  partly  in  the 
French  sense,  partly  also  in  the  loftier  English  sense,)  it 
might  be  imagined  that  Southey  would  be  a  more  eligible 
companion  than  Wordsworth.  But  this  is  not  so  ;  and 
chiefly  for  three  reasons  which  more  than  counterbalance 
Southey' s  greater  amiability  ;  first,  because  the  natural 
reserve  of  Southey,  which  I  have  mentioned  before,  makes 
it  peculiarly  difficult  to  place  yourself  on  terms  of  inti- 
macy with  him ;  secondly,  because  the  range  of  his  con- 
versation is  more  limited  than  that  of  Wordsworth  — 
dealing  less  with  life  and  the  interests  of  life  —  more 
exclusively  with  books  ;  thirdly,  because  the  style  of  h's 
conversation  is  less  flowing  and  diffusive  —  less  expansive 
—  more  apt  to  clothe  itself  in  a  keen,  sparkling,  aphoris- 
tic form  —  consequently  much  sooner  and  more  frequently 
coming  to  an  abrupt  close.  A  sententious,  epigrammatic 
form  of  delivering  opinions  has  a  certain  effect  of  clench* 
ing  a  subject,  which  makes  it  difficult  to  pursue  it  without 
a  corresponding  smartness  of  expression,  and  something 


WORDSWORTH  AND  SOUTHEY. 


405 


•of  the  same  antithetic  point  and  equilibration  of  clauses 
Not  that  the  reader  is  to  suppose  in  Southey  a  showy 
master  of  rhetoric  and  colloquial  sword-play,  seeking  to 
strike  and  to  dazzle  by  his  brilliant  hits  or  adroit  evasions. 
The  very  opposite  is  the  truth.  He  seeks,  indeed,  to  be 
effective,  not  for  the  sake  of  display,  but  as  the  readiest 
means  of  retreating  from  display,  and  the  necessity  for 
display :  feeling  that  his  station  in  literature  and  his 
laurelled  honors  make  him  a  mark  for  the  curiosity  and 
interest  of  the  company  —  that  a  standing  appeal  is  con- 
stantly turning  to  him  for  his  opinion  —  a  latent  call 
always  going  on  for  his  voice  on  the  question  of  the  mo- 
ment —  he  is  anxious  to  comply  with  this  requisition  at  as 
slight  a  cost  as  may  be  of  thought  and  time.  His  heart  is 
continually  reverting  to  his  wife,  viz.  his  library  ;  and 
that  he  may  waste  as  little  effort  as  possible  upon  his  con- 
versational exercises  —  that  the  little  he  wishes  to  say  may 
appear  pregnant  with  much  meaning  —  he  finds  it  advan- 
tageous, and,  moreover,  the  style  of  his  mind  naturally 
prompts  him,  to  adopt  a  trenchant,  pungent,  aculeated 
form  of  terse,  glittering,  stenographic  sentences  —  sayings 
which  have  the  air  of  laying  down  the  law  without  any 
locus  pen  it enticB  or  privilege  of  appeal,  but  are  not  meant 
to  do  so  ;  in  short,  aiming  at  brevity  for  the  company  as 
well  as  for  himself,  by  cutting  off  all  opening  for  discussion 
and  desultory  talk,  through  the  sudden  winding  up  that 
belongs  to  a  sententious  aphorism.  The  hearer  feels  that 
'  the  record  is  closed  ; '  and  he  has  a  sense  of  this  result  as 
having  been  accomplished  by  something  like  an  oracular 
laying  down  of  the  law  ex  cathedra  :  but  this  is  an  indirect 
collateral  impression  from  Southey' s  manner,  and  far  from 
the  one  he  meditates  or  wishes.  An  oracular  manner  he 
<loes  certainly  affect  in  certain  dilemmas  of  a  languishing 
or  loitering  conversation  ;  not  the  peremptoriness,  meaa- 


106 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


time,  not  the  imperiousness  of  the  oracle  is  what  he  seek^ 
for,  but  its  brevity,  its  dispatch,  its  conclusiveness. 

Finally,  as  a  fourth  reason  why  Sou  they  is  less  fitted 
for  a  genial  companion  than  Wordsworth,  his  spirits  have 
been,  of  late  years,  in  a  lowe?  key  than  those  of  the 
latter.  The  tone  of  Southey's  animal  spirits  was  nevei 
at  any  time  raised  beyond  the  standard  of  an  ordinary 
sympathy  ;  there  was  in  him  no  tumult,  no  agitation  of 
passion ;  his  organic  and  constitutional  sensibilities  were 
healthy,  sound,  perhaps  strong  —  but  not  profound,  not 
excessive.  Cheerful  he  was,  and  animated  at  all  times  ; 
but  he  levied  no  tributes  on  the  spirits  or  the  feelings 
beyond  what  all  people  could  furnish.  One  reason  why 
his  bodily  temperament  never,  like  that  of  Wordsworth, 
threw  him  into  a  state  of  tumultuous  excitement,  which 
required  intense  and  elaborate  conversation  to  work  off 
the  excessive  fervor,  was,  that,  over  and  above  his  far 
less  fervid  constitution  of  mind  and  body.  Sou  they  rarely 
took  any  exercise  ;  he  led  a  life  as  sedentary,  except  for 
the  occasional  excursions  in  summer,  (extorted  from  his 
sense  of  kindness  and  hospitality,)  as  that  of  a  city 
tailor.  And  it  was  surprising  to  many  people,  who  did 
not  know  by  experience  the  prodigious  effect  upon  the 
mere  bodily  health  of  regular  and  congenial  mental 
labor,  that  Southey  should  be  able  to  maintain  health  so 
regular,  and  cheerfulness  so  uniformly  serene.  Cheerful, 
however,  he  was,  in  those  early  years  of  my  acquaint- 
ance with  him ;  but  it  was  manifest  to  a  thoughtful 
observer,  that  his  golden  equanimity  was  bound  up  in  a 
threefold  chain,  in  a  conscience  clear  of  all  offence,  in 
the  recurring  enjoyments  from  his  honorable  industry,  and 
m  the  gratification  of  his  parental  affections.  If  any  one 
chord  should  give  way,  there  (it  seemed)  would  be  an 
end  to  Southey's  tranquillity.    He  had  a  son  at  that  time. 


WORDSWOETH  AND  SOUTHEY. 


407 


'Herbert  *  Sou  they,  a  child  in  petticoats  when  I  first  knew 
him,  very  interesting  even  then,  but  annually  putting 
forth  fresh  blossoms  of  unusual  promise,  that  made  even 
indifferent  people  fear  for  the  safety  of  one  so  finely 
organized,  so  delicate  in  his  sensibilities,  and  so  prema- 
turely accomplished.  As  to  his  father,  it  became  evident, 
that  he  lived  almost  in  the  light  of  young  Herbert's 
smiles,  and  that  the  very  pulses  of  his  heart  played  in 
unison  to  the  sound  of  his  son's  laughter.  There  was  in 
his  manner  towards  this  child,  and  towards  this  only, 
something  that  marked  an  excess  of  delirious  doating, 
perfectly  unlike  the  ordinary  chastened  movements  of 
Southey's  affections  ;  and  something  also,  which  indicated 
a  vague  fear  about  him  ;  a  premature  unhappiness,  as  if 
already  the  inaudible  tread  of  calamity  could  be  perceived, 
as  if  already  he  had  lost  him  ;  which,  for  the  latter  years 
of  the  boy's  life,  seemed  to  poison  the  blessing  of  his 
presence. 

A  stronger  evidence  I  cannot  give  of  Southey's  trem- 
bling apprehen.siveness  about  this  child,  than  that  the  only 
rude  thing  I  ev3r  knew  him  to  do,  the  only  discourteous 

♦  Why  he  was  called  Herbert,  if  my  young  readers  inquire,  I 
must  reply,  that  I  do  not  precisely  know;  because  I  know  of  reasons 
too  many  by  half  why  he  might  have  been  so  called.  Derwent  Coler- 
idge, the  second  son  of  Samuel  Taylor  Coleridge,  and  first  cousin 
of  Herbert  Southey,  was  so  called  from  the  Lake  of  Keswick,  com- 
monly styled  Derwent  Water,  which  gave  the  title  of  Earl  to  the  noblo 
and  the  noble-minded,  though  erring  family  of  the  Radcliffes,  who 
gave  up,  like  heroes  and  martyrs,  their  lives  and  the  finest  estates 
in  England,  for  one  who  was  incapable  of  appreciating  the  service. 
One  of  the  islands  on  this  lake  is  dedicated  to  St  Herbert,  and  this 
might  have  given  a  name  to  Southey's  first-born  child.  But  it  is 
more  probable,  that  he  derived  this  name  from  Br.  Herbert,  uncle 
to  the  laureate. 


408 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


thing,  was  done  on  Ms  account.  A  party  of  us,  chiefly 
composed  of  Southey's  family  and  his  visitors,  were  in  ft 
sailboat  upon  the  lake.  Herbert  was  one  of  this  party ; 
and  at  that  time  not  above  five  or  six  years  old.  In 
landing  upon  one  of  the  islands,  most  of  the  gentlemen 
were  occupied  in  assisting  the  ladies  over  the  thwarts  of 
the  boat;  and  one  gentleman,  merely  a  stranger,  observ- 
ing this,  good-naturedly  took  up  Herbert  in  his  arms,  and 
was  stepping  with  him  most  carefully  from  thwart  to 
thwart,  when  Southey,  in  a  perfect  frenzy  of  anxiety  for 
his  boy,  his  '  moon  '  as  he  used  to  call  him,  (I  suppose 
from  some  pun  of  his  own,  or  some  mistake  of  the  child's 
upon  the  equivocal  word  sun,)  rushed  forward,  and  tore 
him  out  of  the  arms  of  the  stranger  without  one  word  of 
apology  ;  nor,  in  fact,  under  the  engrossing  panic  of  the 
moment,  lest  an  unsteady  movement  along  with  the  rock- 
ing and  undulating  of  the  boat  should  throw  his  little  boy 
overboard  into  the  somewhat  stormy  waters  of  the  lake, 
did  Southey  become  aware  of  his  own  exceedingly  dis- 
courteous action  —  fear  for  his  boy  quelled  his  very 
power  of  perception.  That  the  stranger,  on  reflection, 
understood,  a  race  of  emotions  travelled  over  his  counte- 
nance. I  saw  the  whole,  a  silent  observer  from  the  shore. 
First  a  hasty  blush  of  resentment  mingled  with  astonish- 
ment :  then  a  good-natured  smile  of  indulgence  to  the 
naivete  of  the  paternal  feeling  as  displaying  itself  in  the 
act,  and  the  accompanying  gestures  of  frenzied  impa- 
tience ;  finally,  a  considerate,  grave  expression  of  acqui- 
escence in  the  whole  act ;  but  with  a  pitying  look  towards 
father  and  son,  as  too  probably  destined  under  such 
agony  of  afi"ection  to  trials  perhaps  insupportable.  If  I 
interpreted  aright  the  stranger's  feelings,  he  did  not  read 
their  destinies  amiss.    Herbert  became,  with  his  growing 


WORDSWOETH  AND  SOXJTHBY 


409 


years,  a  child  of  more  and  more  hope  ;  but,  therefore, 
the  object  of  more  and  more  fearful  solicitude.  He  read, 
and  read  ;  and  he  became  at  laot 

*  A  very  learned  youth  '  — 

to  borrow  a  line  from  his  uncle's  beautiful  poem  on  the 
wild  boy,  who  fell  into  a  heresy,  whilst  living  under  the 
patronage  of  a  Spanish  grandee,  and,  finally,  escaped 
from  a  probable  martyrdom,  by  sailing  up  a  great 
American  river  wide  as  any  sea,  after  which  he  was  never 
heard  of  again.  The  learned  youth  of  the  river  Greta  had 
an  earlier  and  more  sorrowful  close  to  his  career.  Possi- 
bly from  want  of  exercise,  combined  with  inordinate 
exercise  of  the  cerebral  organs,  a  disease  gradually 
developed  itself  in  the  heart.  It  was  not  a  mere  disorder 
in  the  functions,  it  was  a  disease  in  the  structure  of  the 
organ,  and  admitted  of  no  permanent  relief,  consequently 
of  no  final  hope.  He  died ;  and  with  him  died  for  ever 
the  golden  hopes,  the  radiant  felicity,  and  the  internal 
serenity,  of  the  unhappy  father.  It  was  from  Southey 
himself,  speaking  without  external  signs  of  agitation, 
calmly,  dispassionately,  almost  coldly,  but  with  the  cold- 
ness of  a  settled  despondency,  that  I  heard,  whilst  accom- 
panying him  through  Grasmere  on  his  road  homewards 
to  Keswick,  from  some  visit  he  had  been  paying  to 
Wordsworth  at  Rydal  Mount,  his  settled  feelings  and 
convictions  as  connected  with  that  loss  ;  for  him,  in  this 
world,  he  said,  happiness  there  could  be  none ;  for  that 
his  tenderest  affections,  the  very  deepest  by  many  degrees 
which  he  had  ever  known,  were  now  buried  in  the  grave 
with  his  youthful  and  too  brilliant  Herbert. 


no 


XIIEBA.BY  BEMI]^ISC£NC£S. 


CHAPTER  XIV. 


SOUTHEY,  WORDSWORTH,  AND  COLERIDGE. 


A  CIRCUMSTANCE  which,  as  much  as  anything,  expoun»3« 
Ed  to  every  eye  the  characteristic  distinctions  between 
Wordsworth  and  Southey,  and  would  not  suffer  a  stranger 
to  forget  it  for  a  moment,  was  the  insignificant  place  and 
consideration  allowed  to  the  small  book-collection  of  the 
former,  contrasted  with  the  splendid  library  of  the  latter. 
The  two  or  three  hundred  volumes  of  Wordsworth  occu- 
pied a  little,  homely,  painted  book-case,  fixed  into  one  of 
two  shallow  recesses,  formed  on  each  side  of  the  fireplace 
by  the  projection  of  the  chimney  in  the  little  sitting-rooir 
up  stairs,  which  he  had  already  described  as  his  half 
kitchen  and  half  parlor.  They  were  ill  bound,  or  not 
bound  at  all — in  boards,  sometimes  in  tatters;  many 
were  imperfect  as  to  the  number  of  volumes,  mutilated  as 
to  the  number  of  pages;  sometimes,  where  it  seemed 
worth  while,  the  defects  being  supplied  by  manuscript; 
sometimes  not:  in  short,  everything  showed  that  the 
books  were  for  use,  and  not  for  show ;  and  their  limited 
amount  showed  that  their  possessor  must  have  independent 
sources  of  enjoyment  to  fill  up  the  major  part  of  his  time. 
In  reality,  when  the  weather  was  tolerable,  I  believe  tha^ 
Wordsworth  rarely  resorted  to  his  books,  (unless,  perhaps, 
to  some  little  pocket  edition  of  a  poet,  which  accompanied 
Uim  in  his  rambles,)  except  in  the  evenings,  or  after 
fte  had  tired  himself  by  walking.    On  the  other  hand, 


SOUTHET,  WORDSWORTH.  AND  COLERIDGE.  411 

Bouthey's  collection  occupied  a  separate  room,  the  largest, 
iind,  every  way,  the  m  )st  agreeable  in  the  house ;  and 
this  room  was  styled,  an  i  not  ostentatiously,  (for  it  really 
merited  that  name,)  the  library.  The  house  itself,  Greta 
Hall,  stood  upon  a  little  eminence,  (as  I  have  before 
mentioned,)  overhanging  the  river  Greta.  There  was 
nothing  remarkable  in  its  internal  arrangements ;  in  all 
respects  it  was  a  very  plain,  unadorned  family  dwelling ; 
large  enough,  by  a  little  contrivance,  to  accommodate  two, 
or,  in  some  sense,  three  families,  viz.  Mr.  Southey,  and 
his  family ;  Mr.  Coleridge  and  his ;  together  with  Mrs. 
Lovell,  who,  when  her  son  was  with  her,  might  be  said  to 
compose  a  third.  Mrs.  Coleridge,  Mrs.  Southey,  and  Mrs. 
Lovell,  were  sisters ;  all  having  come  originally  from 
Bristol ;  and,  as  the  different  sets  of  children  in  this  one 
house  had  each  three  several  aunts,  all  the  ladies,  by  turns, 
assuming  that  relation  twice  over,  it  was  one  of  Southey's 
many  amusing  jests,  to  call  the  hill  on  which  Greta  Hall 
was  placed,  the  ant-hill,  Mrs.  Lovell  was  the  widow  of 
Mr.  Robert  Lovell,  who  had  published  a  volume  of  poems, 
in  conjunction  with  Southey,  somewhere  about  the  year 
1797,  under  the  signatures  of  Bion  and  Moschus.  This 
lady,  having  one  only  son,  did  not  require  any  large  suite 
of  rooms ;  and  the  less  so,  as  her  son  quitted  her  at  an 
early  age,  to  pursue  a  professional  education.  The  house 
had,  therefore,  been  divided  (not  by  absolute  partition  into 
two  distinct    apartments,  but  by  an  amicable  distribution 

*  *  Into  two  distinct  apartments.^  —  The  word  apartment,  meaning, 
in  effect,  a  compartment  of  a  house,  already  includes,  in  its  proper 
sense,  a  suite  of  rooms  ;  and  it  is  a  mere  vulgar  error^  arising  cut  of 
the  ambitious  usage  of  lodging-house  keepers,  to  talk  of  one  family 
or  an  establishment  occupying  apartments,  in  the  plural.  The 
Queen's  apartment  at  St  James's  or  at  Versailles  —  not  the  Queen'i 
apartments  —  is  the  correct  expression. 


(12 


XITERARY  EEMINISCENCES. 


of  rooms)  between  the  two  families  of  Mr.  Coleridge  and 
Mr.  Sou  they ;  Mr.  Coleridge  had  a  separate  study,  which 
was  distinguished  by  nothing  except  by  an  organ  amongst 
its  furniture,  and  by  a  magnificent  view  from  its  window, 
(or  windows,)  if  that  could  be  considered  a  distinction,  in 
a  situation  whose  local  necessities  presented  you  with 
magnificent  objects  in  whatever  direction  you  might  hap- 
pen to  turn  your  eyes. 

In  the  morning,  the  two  families  might  live  apart ;  but 
they  met  at  dinner,  and  in  a  common  drawing-room;  and 
Southey's  library,  in  both  senses  of  the  word,  was  placed 
at  the  service  of  all  the  ladies  alike.  However,  they  did 
not  intrude  upon  him,  except  in  cases  where  they  wished 
for  a  larger  reception  room,  or  a  more  interesting  place 
for  suggesting  the  topics  of  conversation.  Interesting  this 
room  was,  indeed,  and  in  a  degree  not  often  rivalled.  The 
library  —  the  collection  of  books,  I  mean,  which  formed 
the  most  conspicuous  part  of  its  furniture  within  —  was  in 
all  senses  a  good  one.  The  books  were  chiefly  English, 
Spanish,  and  Portuguese ;  well  selected,  being  the  great 
cardinal  classics  of  the  three  literatures ;  fine  copies,  and 
decorated  externally  with  a  reasonable  elegance,  so  as  to 
make  them  in  harmony  with  the  other  embellishments  of 
the  room.  This  effect  was  aided  by  the  horizontal  ar- 
rangement upon  brackets,  of  many  rare  manuscripts  — 
Spanish  or  Portuguese.  Made  thus  gay  within,  this  room 
stood  in  little  need  of  attractions  from  without.  Yet,  even 
upon  the  gloomiest  day  of  winter,  the  landscape  from  the 
different  windows  was  too  permanently  commanding  in  its 
grandeur,  too  essentially  independent  of  the  seasons  or  the 
pomp  of  woods,  to  fail  in  fascinating  the  gaze  of  the  cold- 
est and  dullest  of  spectators.  The  lake  of  Derwent  Water 
in  one  direction,  with  its  lovely  islands  —  a  lake  about  ten 
miles  in  circuit,  and  shaped  pretty  much  like  a  boy's  kite ; 


SOUTHEY,  WORDSWORTH,  AND  COLERIDGE.  413 

^he  lake  of  Bassinthwaite  in  another  ;  the  mountains  of 
Newlands  arranging  themselves  like  pavilions ;  the  gor* 
geous  confusion  of  Borrowdale  just  revealing  its  sublime 
chaos  through  the  narrow  vista  of  its  gorge  ;  all  these 
objects  lay  in  different  angles  to  the  front ;  whilst  the 
Bullen  rear,  not  fully  visible  on  this  side  of  the  house, 
was  closed  for  many  a  league  by  the  vast  and  towering 
masses  of  Skiddaw  and  Blencathara  —  mountains  which 
are  rather  to  be  considered  as  frontier  barriers,  and  chains 
of  hilly  ground,  cutting  the  county  of  Cumberland  into 
great  chambers  and  different  climates,  than  as  insulated 
eminences,  so  vast  is  the  area  which  they  occupy  ;  though 
there  are  also  such  separate  and  insulated  heights,  and 
nearly  amongst  the  highest  in  the  country.  Southey's 
lot  had  therefore  fallen,  locally  considered,  into  a  goodly 
heritage.  This  grand  panorama  of  mountain  scenery,  so 
varied,  so  expansive,  and  yet  having  the  delightful  feeling 
about  it  of  a  deep  seclusion  and  dell-like  sequestration 
from  the  world  —  a  feeling  which,  in  the  midst  of  so 
expansive  an  area,  spread  out  below  his  windows,  could 
not  have  been  sustained  by  any  barriers  less  elevated  than 
Glaramara,  Skiddaw,  or  (which  could  be  also  descried) 
'  the  mighty  Helvellyn  and  Catchedicam ; '  this  congrega- 
tion of  hill  and  lake,  so  wide,  and  yet  so  prison-like,  in  its 
separation  from  all  beyond  it,  lay  for  ever  under  the  eyes 
of  Southey.  His  position  locally,  and,  in  some  respects, 
intellectually,  reminded  one  of  Gibbon  :  but  with  great 
ndvantage  in  the  comparison  to  Southey.  The  little  town 
of  Keswick  and  its  adjacent  lake  bore  something  of  the 
same  relation  to  mighty  London  that  Geneva  and  its  lake 
may  be  thought  to  bear  towards  brilliant  Paris.  Southey, 
like  Gibbon,  was  a  miscellaneous  scholar  ;  he,  like  Gib- 
bon, of  vast  historical  research  ;  he,  like  Gibbon,  signally 
ndustrious,  and  patient,  and  elaborate  in  collecting  tha 


414 


LITERARY  REMINISCEKCES. 


materials  for  his  historical  works.  Like  Gibbon,  he  had 
dedicated  a  life  of  competent  ease,  in  a  pecuniary  sense, 
to  literature  ;  like  Gibbon,  he  had  gathered  to  the  shores 
of  a  beautiful  lake,  remote  from  great  capitals,  a  large, 
or,  at  least,  sufficient  library ;  (in  each  case,  I  believe,  the 
library  ranged,  as  to  numerical  amount,  between  seven 
and  ten  thousand  ;)  and,  like  Gibbon,  he  was  the  most 
accomplished  litterateur  amongst  the  erudite  scholars  of 
his  time,  and  the  most  of  an  erudite  scholar  amongst  the 
accomplished  litterateurs.  After  all  these  points  of  agree- 
ment known,  it  remains  as  a  pure  advantage  on  the  side 
of  Southey  —  a  mere  lucro  ponatur  —  that  he  was  a  poet ; 
and,  by  all  men's  confession,  a  respectable  poet,  brilliant 
in  his  descriptive  powers,  and  fascinating  in  his  narration, 
however  much  he  might  want  of 

*  The  vision  and  the  faculty  divine.' 

It  is  remarkable  amongst  the  series  of  parallelisms  that 
have  been  or  might  be  pursued  between  two  men,  both 
had  the  honor  of  retreating  from  a  parliamentary  life  ;^ 
Gibbon,  after  some  silent  and  inert  experience  of  that 
warfare  ;  Southey,  with  a  prudent  foresight  of  the  ruin  to 
his  health  and  literary  usefulness,  won  from  the  experience 
of  his  nearest  friends. 

I  took  leave  of  Southey  in  1807,  at  the  descent  into  the 

*  It  illustrated  the  national  sense  of  Southey's  comprehensive  tal- 
ents, and  of  his  political  integrity,  that  Lord  Radnor  (the  same  who, 
under  the  courtesy  title  of  Lord  Folkestone,  had  distinguished  him- 
self for  very  democratic  politics  in  the  House  of  Commons,  and  had 
even  courted  the  technical  designation  of  radical)  was  the  man  who 
offered  to  bring  in  Southey  for  a  borough  dependent  on  his  influence. 
\Bir  Robert  Peel,  under  the  same  sense  of  Southey's  merits,  ha(J 
offered  him  a  baronetcy.  Both  honors  were  declined  on  the  same 
prudential  considerations,  and  with  the  same  perfect  disregard  of  all 
temptations  from  personal  vanity. 


80X3  THEY,  WORDSWORTH,  AND  COLERIDGE.  415 

ralo  of  Legbesthwaite,  as  I  have  already  noticed.  One 
year  afterwards,  I  became  a  permanent  resident  in  his 
neighborhood ;  and,  although,  on  various  accounts,  my 
intercourse  with  him  was  at  no  time  very  strict,  partly 
from  the  very  uncongenial  constitution  of  my  own  mind, 
and  the  different  direction  of  my  studies,  partly  from  my 
reluctance  to  levy  any  tax  on  time  so  precious  and  so  fully 
employed,  I  was  yet  on  such  terms  for  the  next  ten  or 
eleven  years,  that  I  might,  in  a  qualified  sense,  call  myself 
his  friend. 

Yes  !  there  were  long  years  through  which  Southey 
might  respect  me,  I  him.  But  the  years  came  —  for  I 
have  lived  too  long,  reader,  in  relation  to  many  things  ! 
and  the  report  of  me  would  have  been  better,  or  more 
uniform  at  least,  had  I  died  some  twenty  years  ago  —  the 
years  came,  in  which  circumstances  made  me  an  Opium- 
Eater  ;  years  through  which  a  shadow  as  of  sad  eclipse 
sate  and  rested  upon  my  faculties  ;  years  through  which  I 
was  careless  of  all  but  those  who  lived  within  my  inner 
circle,  within  '  my  heart  of  hearts  ; '  years  —  ah  !  heaven- 
ly years !  —  through  which  I  lived,  beloved,  with  thee,  to 
thee,  for  thee,  hy  thee  !  Ah  !  happy,  happy  years  !  in 
which  I  was  a  mere  football  of  reproach,  but  in  which 
every  wind  and  sounding  hurricane  of  wrath  or  contempt 
flew  by  like  chasing  enemies  past  some  defying  gates  of 
adamant,  and  left  me  too  blessed  in  thy  smiles  —  angel  of 
life  !  —  to  heed  the  curses  or  the  mocking  which  some- 
times I  heard  raving  outside  of  our  impregnable  Eden. 
What  any  man  said  of  me  in  those  days,  what  he  thought, 
Jid  I  ask  ?  did  I  care  ?  Then  it  was,  or  nearly  then,  that 
I  ceased  to  see,  ceased  to  hear  of  Southey  ;  as  much  ab- 
\tracted  from  all  which  concerned  the  world  outside,  and 
rrom  the  Southeys,  or  even  the  Coleridges,  in  its  van,  aa 
though  I  had  lived  with  the  darlings  of  my  heart  in  the 


416 


lilTEEART  KEMINISCENCES. 


centre  of  Canadian  forests,  and  all  men  else  in  the  centre 
of  Hindostan. 

But  before  I  part  from  Greta  Hall  and  its  distinguished 
master,  out  word  let  me  say,  to  protect  myself  from  the 
imputation  of  sharing  in  some  peculiar  opinions  of  Southey 
with  respect  to  political  economy,  which  have  been  but 
too  familiar  to  the  world  ;  and  some  opinions  of  the  world, 
hardly  less  familiar,  with  respect  to  Southey  himself  and 
his  accomplishments.  Probably,  with  respect  to  the  first, 
before  this  paper  will  be  made  public,  I  shall  have  suffi- 
ciently vindicated  my  own  opinions  in  these  matters  by 
a  distinct  treatment  of  some  great  questions  which  lie  at 
the  base  of  all  sound  political  economy  ;  above  all,  the 
radical  question  of  value,  upon  which  no  man  has  ever 
seen  the  full  truth,  except  Mr.  Ricardo  ;  and,  unfortu- 
nately, he  had  but  little  of  the  polemic'^  skill  which  is 
required  to  meet  the  errors  of  his  opponents.  For  it  is 
noticeable  that  the  most  conspicuous  of  those  opponents, 
viz.  Mr.  Mai  thus,  though  too  much,  I  fear,  actuated  by  a 
spirit  of  jealousy,  and,  therefore,  likely  enough  to  have 
scattered  sophistry  and  disingenuous  quibbling  over  the 
subject,  had  no  need  whatever  of  any  further  confusior. 
for  darkening  and  perplexing  his  themes  than  what  inevi- 
tably belonged  to  his  own  most  chaotic  understanding. 

*  *  Polemic  skill.'  —  The  word  polemic  is  falsely  interpreted  by  the 
majority  of  mere  English  readers.  Having  seldom  seen  it  used  except 
in  a  case  of  theological  controversy,  they  fancy  that  it  has  some 
original  and  etymological  appropriation  to  such  a  use ;  whereas  it 
expresses,  with  regard  to  all  subjects,  without  restriction,  the  func- 
rions  of  the  debater  as  opposed  to  those  of  the  original  orator  ;  the 
functions  of  him  who  meets  error  and  unravels  confusion  or  misrep 
resentation,  opposed  to  those  of  him  who  lays  down  the  abstract 
truth:  truth  absolute  and  without  relation  to  the  modes  of  viewing  it 
As  well  might  the  word  Radical  be  limited  to  a  political  use  as 
Polemic  to  controversial  divinity.  . 


SOUTHET,  WORDSWORTH,  AND  COLERIDGE.  417 

He  and  Say,  the  Frenchman,  were  both  plagued  by  un- 
derstandings of  the  same  quality  —  having  a  clear  vision 
in  shallow  waters,  and  thus  misleading  them  into  the 
belief  that  they  saw  with  equal  clearness  through  the 
remote  and  the  obscure  ;  whereas,  universally,  their  acute- 
ness  is  like  that  of  Hobbes  —  the  gift  of  shallowness,  and 
the  result  of  not  being  subtle  or  profound  enough  to  ap- 
prehend the  true  locus  of  the  difficulty  ;  and  the  barriers, 
w^hich  to  them  limit  the  view,  and  give  to  it,  together  with 
the  contraction,  all  the  distinctness  and  definite  outline  of 
limitation,  are,  in  nine  cases  out  of  ten,  the  product  of 
their  own  defective  and  aberrating  vision,  and  not  real 
barriers  at  all. 

Meantime,  until  I  write  fully  and  deliberately  upon  this 
subject,  I  shall  observe,  simply,  that  all  '  the  Lake  Poets,' 
as  they  are  called,  were  not  only  in  error,  but  most  pre- 
sumptuously in  error,  upon  these  subjects.  They  were 
ignorant  of  every  principle  belonging  to  every  question 
alke  in  political  economy,  and  they  were  obstinately  bent 
upon  learning  nothing  ;  they  were  all  alike  too  proud  to 
acknowledge  that  any  man  knew  better  than  they,  unless 
it  were  upon  some  purely  professional  subject,  or  some 
art  remote  from  all  intellectual  bearings,  such  as  conferred 
no  honor  in  its  possession.  Wordsworth  was  the  least 
tainted  with  error  upon  political  economy ;  and  that 
because  he  rarely  applied  his  thoughts  to  any  question  of 
laat  nature,  and,  in  fact,  despised  every  study  of  a  moral 
)r  political  aspect,  unless  it  drew  its  materials  from  such 
revelations  of  truth  as  could  be  won  from  the  prima  phi- 
losophia  of  human  nature  approached  with  the  poet's  eye. 
Coleridge  was  the  one  whom  Nature  and  his  own  multi- 
farious studies  had  the  best  qualified  for  thinking  justly  on 
\  theme  such  as  this  ;  but  he  also  was  shut  out  from  the 
possibility  of  knowledge  by  presumption,  and  the  habit  of 
27 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


despising  all  the  analytic  studies  of  his  own  day  —  a  habit 
or  which  he  certainly  had  some  warrant  in  the  peculiar 
'eehleness  of  all  that  has  offered  itself  for  philosophy  in 
modern  England.  In  particular,  the  religious  discussions 
of  the  age,  which  touch  inevitably  at  every  point  upon 
the  profounder  philosophy  of  man  and  his  constitution, 
had  laid  bare  the  weakness  of  his  own  age  to  Coleridge's 
eye  ;  and,  because  all  was  hollow  and  trivial  in  this 
direction,  he  chose  to  think  that  it  was  so  in  every  other. 
And  hence  he  has  laid  himself  open  to  the  just  scoffs  of 
persons  far  inferior  to  himself.  In  a  foot-note  in  some 
late  number  of  the  Westminster  Review,  it  is  most  truly 
asserted,  (not  in  these  words,  but  to  this  effect,)  that 
Coleridges's  '  Table  Talk  '  exhibits  a  superannuation  of 
error  fit  only  for  two  centuries  before.  And  what  gave 
peculiar  point  to  this  display  of  ignorance  was,  that  Coler- 
idge did  not,  like  Wordsworth,  dismiss  political  economy 
from  his  notice  disdainfully,  as  a  puerile  tissue  of  truisms, 
or  of  falsehoods  not  less  obvious,  but  actually  addressed 
himself  to  the  subject ;  fancied  he  had  made  discoveries 
in  the  science  ;  and  even  promised  us  a  systematic  work 
on  its  whole  compass. 

To  give  a  sample  of  this  new  and  reformed  political 
economy,  it  cannot  well  be  necessary  to  trouble  the  reader 
with  more  than  one  chimera  culled  from  those  which  Mr. 
Coleridge  first  brought  forward  in  his  early  model  of 
'  The  Friend.'  He  there  propounds,  as  an  original 
hypothesis  of  his  own,  that  taxation  never  burthens  a 
people,  or,  as  a  mere  possibility,  can  burthen  a  people, 
simply  by  its  amount.  And  why  ?  Surely  it  draws  from 
the  purse  of  him  who  pays  the  quota,  a  sum  which  may 
be  very  difficult  or  even  ruinous  for  him  to  pay,  were  it 
no  more  important  in  a  public  point  of  view  than  as  so 
^uch  deducted  from  his  own  unproductive  expenditure. 


SOUTHET,  -WOKDSWORTH,  iLND  COLERIDGE.  419 

and  which  may  happen  to  have  even  a  national  importance 
If  it  should  chance  to  be  deducted  from  the  funds  destined 
to  productive  industry.  What  is  Mr.  Coleridge's  answer 
to  these  little  objections  ?  Why,  thus  :  the  latter  case  he 
evades  entirely,  apparently  not  adverting  to  it  as  a  case  in 
any  respect  distinguished  from  the  other ;  and  this  other 
—  how  is  that  answered  ?  Doubtless,  says  Mr.  Coleridge, 
it  may  be  inconvenient  to  John  or  Samuel  that  a  sum  of 
money,  other\T  .^e  disposable  for  their  own  separate  uses, 
should  be  abstracted  for  the  purchase  of  bayonets,  or 
grape-shot ;  but  with  this  the  public,  the  commonwealth, 
have  nothing  to  do,  any  more  than  with  the  losses  at  a 
gaming-table,  where  A's  loss  is  B's  gain  —  the  total  funds 
of  the  nation  remaining  exactly  the  same.  It  is,  in  fact, 
nothing  but  the  accidental  distribution  of  the  funds  which 
is  affecteu  ~  —  possibly  for  the  worse,  (no  other  '  worse/ 
however,  is  contemplated  than  shifting  it  into  hands  less 
deserving,)  but,  also,  by  possibility,  for  the  better  ;  and 
the  better  and  the  worse  may  be  well  supposed,  in  the 
long  run,  to  balance  each  other.  And  that  this  is  Mr. 
Coleridge's  meaning  cannot  be  doubted,  upon  looking 
into  his  illustrative  image  in  support  of  it :  he  says  that 
money  raised  by  Government  in  the  shape  of  taxes  is 
like  moisture  exhaled  from  the  earth  —  doubtless,  for  the 
moment  injurious  to  the  crops,  but  reacting  abundantly 
^or  their  final  benefit  when  returning  in  the  shape  of 
-showers.  So  natural,  so  obvious,  so  inevitable,  by  the 
way,  is  this  conceit,  (or,  to  speak  less  harshly,  this 
hypothesis,)  and  so  equally  natural,  obvious,  and  inevita- 
ble is  the  illustration  from  the  abstraction  and  restoration 
of  moisture,  the  exhalations  and  rains  which  affect  this 
earth  of  ours,  like  the  systole  and  diastole  of  the  heart, 
the  flux  and  reflux  of  the  ocean,  that  precisely  the  sam« 
doctrine,  and  precisely  the  same  exemplification  of  thf 


420 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


doctrine,  is  to  be  found  in  a  Parliamentary  speech,*  of 
some  orator  in  the  famous  long  Parliament,  about  the 
year  1642.  And  to  my  mind  it  was  a  bitter  humiliation 
to  find,  about  150  years  afterwards,  in  a  shallow  French 
work,  the  famous  '  Compte  Rendu  '  of  the  French  Chan- 
cellor of  the  Exchequer,  (Comptroller  of  the  Finances)  — 
Neckar  — in  that  work,  most  humiliating  it  was  to  me,  on 
a  certain  day,  that  I  found  this  idle  Coleridgian  fantasy, 
not  merely  repeated,  as  it  had  been  by  scores  —  not 
merely  anticipated  by  full  twenty  and  two  years,  so  that 
these  French  people  had  been  beforehand  with  him,  and 
had  made  Coleridge,  to  all  appearance,  their  plagiarist, 
but  also  i^hear  it,  ye  gods !)  answered,  satisfactorily 
refuted,  by  this  very  feeble  old  sentimentalist,  Neckar. 
Yes  ;  positively  Neckar,  the  slipshod  old  system-fancier 
and  political  driveller,  had  been  so  much  above  falling 
into  the  shallow  snare,  that  he  had,  on  sound  principles, 
exposed  its  specious  delusions. 

Coleridge,  the  subtlest  of  men,  in  his  proper  walk,  had 
brought  forward,  as  a  novel  hypothesis  of  his  own,  in 
1810,  what  Neckar,  the  rickety  old  charlatan,  had  scarce- 
ly condescended,  in  a  hurried  foot-note,  to  expose  as  a 
vulgar  error  and  the  shallowest  of  sophisms,  in  1787-88. 
There  was  another  enormous  blunder  which  Coleridge 
was  constantly  authorizing,  both  in  his  writings  and  his 
conversation.  Quoting  a  passage  from  Sir  James  Stuart, 
in  which  he  speaks  of  a  vine-dresser  as  adding  nothing  to 
the  public  wealth,  unless  his  labor  did  something  more 
than  replace  his  own  consumption  —  that  is,  unless  it 
reproduced  it  together  with  a  profit;  he  asks  contemp- 
tuously, whether  the  happiness  and  moral  dignity  that 

*  Reported  at  length  in  a  small  quarto  volume  of  the  well  known 
5[uarto  size  so  much  in  use  for  Tracts,  Pamphlets,  &c.,  throughoul 
Jhe  life  of  Milton-  1608-7? 


80TJTHE"S.  WOKDSWOKTH,  AND  COLERIDGE.  42^ 

may  have  been  exhibited  in  the  vine-dresser's  family  are 
to  pass  for  nothing  ?  And  then  he  proceeds  to  abuse  the 
economists,  because  they  take  no  account  of  such  impor- 
tant considerations.  Doubtless  these  are  invaluable  ele- 
ments of  social  grandeur,  in  a  total  estimate  of  those 
elements.  But  Avhat  has  politic  a'  economy  to  do  with 
them,  a  science  openly  professing  to  insulate  and  to  treat 
apart  from  all  other  constituents  of  national  well-being, 
those  which  concern  the  production  and  circulation  of 
wealth  ?  *  So  far  from  gaining  anything  by  enlarging  its 
field  in  the  way  demanded  by  Coleridge's  critic,  political 
economy  would  be  as  idly  travelling  out  of  the  limits  indi^ 
cated  and  held  forth  in  its  very  name,  as  if  logic  were 
to  teach  ethics,  or  ethics  to  teach  diplomacy.  With 
respect  to  the  Malthusian  doctrine  of  population,  it  is 
difficult  to  know  who  was  the  true  proprietor  of  the  argu- 
ments urged  against  it  sometimes  by  Southey,  sometimes 
by  Coleridge.    Those  used  by  Southey  are  chiefly  to  be 

*  In  fact,  the  exposure  is  as  perfect  in  the  case  of  an  individual  as 
in  that  of  a  nation,  and  more  easily  apprehended.  Levy  from  an 
individual  clothier  £1000  in  taxes,  and  afterwards  return  to  him  the 
whole  of  this  sum  in  payment  for  the  clothing  of  a  regiment.  Then, 
Bupposing  profits  to  be  at  the  rate  of  15  per  cent.,  he  will  have 
replaced  <£150  of  his  previous  loss;  even  his  gains  will  simply 
reinstate  him  in  something  that  he  had  lost,  and  the  remaining 
£850  will  continue  to  be  a  dead  loss;  since  the  £850  restored  to  him, 
exactly  replaces,  by  the  terms  of  this  case,  his  disbursements  in 
wages  and  materials;  if  it  did,  more  profits  would  not  be  at  15  per 
cent.,  according  to  the  supposition.  But  Government  may  spend 
more  than  the  £1000  with  this  clothier;  they  may  spend  £10,000. 
Doubtless,  and  in  that  case,  on  the  same  supposition  as  to  profits,  he 
will  receive  £1500  as  a  nominal  gain  and  £500  will  be  a  real  gain, 
marked  with  the  positive  sign,  (-h.)  But  such  a  case  would  only 
prove,  that  nine  other  tax-payers,  to  an  equal  amount,  had  been  left 
without  any  reimbursement  at  all.  Strange,  that  so  clear  a  case  for 
in  individual,  should  become  obscure  when  it  regards  a  natioa. 


422 


LITERABY  REMINISCENCES. 


found  up  and  down  the  Quarterly  Review,  But  a  more 
elaborate  attack  was  published  by  Hazlitt ;  and  this  must 
be  supposed  to  speak  the  peculiar  objections  of  Coleridge, 
for  he  was  in  the  habit  of  charging  Hazlitt  with  having 
pillaged  his  conversation,  and  occasionally  garbled  it 
throughout  the  whole  of  this  book.  One  single  argument 
there  was,  undoubtedly  just,  and  it  was  one  which  others 
stumbled  upon  no  less  than  Coleridge,  exposing  the  fallacy 
of  the  supposed  different  laws  of  increase  for  vegetable 
and  animal  life.  But  though  this  frail  prop  withdrawn 
took  away  from  Mr.  Mai  thus' s  theory  all  its  scientific 
rigo''  the  main  'practical  conclusions  were  still  valid  as 
respected  any  argument  from  the  lakers ;  for  the  strongest 
of  these  arguments  that  ever  came  to  my  knowledge  was 
a  mere  appeal  —  not  ad  verecundiam,  in  the  ordinary 
sense  of  the  phrase,  but  ad  honestatem,  as  if  it  were 
shocking  to  the  honestum  of  Roman  ethics,  (the  honnetete 
of  French  minor  ethics,)  that  the  check  derived  from  self- 
restraint  should  not  be  supposed  amply  competent  to 
redress  all  the  dangers  from  a  redundant  population 
under  any  certain  knowledge  generally  diffused  that  such 
dangers  existed.  But  these  are  topics  which  it  is  sufficient 
in  this  place  to  have  noticed,  currente  calamo.  I  was  anx- 
ious, however,  to  protest  against  the  probable  imputation, 
that  I,  because  generally  so  intense  an  admirer  of  these 
.«ien,  adopted  their  blind  and  hasty  reveries  in  political 
economy. 

There  were  (and  perhaps  more  justly  I  might  say  there 
are)  two  other  notions  currently  received  about  Southey, 
one  of  which  is  altogether  erroneous,  and  the  other  true 
only  in  a  limited  sense.  The  first  is,  the  belief  that  he 
oelonged  to  what  is  known  as  the  lake  school  in  poetry ; 
nrith  respect  to  which  all  that  I  need  say  in  this  place,  is 
involved  in  his  own  declaration  frankly  made  to  myself  in 


50XJTHEY,  WOEDSWORTH,  AND  COLERIDGE.  423 

Easedale,  during  the  summer  of  1812  ;  that  he  considered 
Wordsworth's  theory  of  poetic  diction,  and  still  more  his 
principles  as  to  the  selection  of  subjects,  and  as  to  what 
constituted  a  poetic  treatment,  as  founded  on  error. 
There  is  certainly  some  community  of  phraseology  between 
Southey  and  the  other  lakers,  naturally  arising  out  of 
their  joint  reverence  for  Scriptural  l^^nguage :  this  was  a 
field  in  which  they  met  in  common  :  else  it  shows  but 
little  discernment  and  power  of  valuing  the  essences  of 
things,  to  have  classed  Southey  in  the  same  school  with 
Wordsworth  and  Coleridge.  The  other  popular  notion 
about  Southey,  which  I  conceive  to  be  expressed  with 
much  too  little  limitation,  regards  his  style.  He  has  been 
praised,  and  justly,  for  his  plain,  manly,  unaffected  Eng- 
lish, until  the  parrot  echoers  of  other  men's  judgments, 
who  adopt  all  they  relish  with  undistinguishing  blindness, 
have  begun  to  hold  him  up  as  a  great  master  of  his  own 
language,  and  a  classical  model  of  fine  composition.  Now, 
if  the  error  were  only  in  the  degree,  it  would  not  be  worth 
while  to  notice  it ;  but  the  truth  is,  that  Southey's  defects 
in  this  particular  power,  are  as  striking  as  his  characteris- 
tic graces.  Let  a  subject  arise  —  and  almost  in  any  path, 
there  is  a  ready  possibility  that  it  should  —  in  which  a 
higher  tone  is  required,  of  splendid  declamation,  or  of 
impassionate  fervor,  and  Southey's  style  will  immediately 
betray  its  want  of  the  loftier  qualities  as  flagrantly  as  it 
now  asserts  its  powers  in  that  unpretending  form,  which  is 
best  suited  to  his  level  character  of  writing  and  his  hum- 
bler choice  of  themes.  It  is  to  mistake  the  character  of 
Southey's  mind,  which  is  elevated  but  not  sustained  by 
the  higher  modes  of  enthusiasm  to  think  otherwise.  Were 
a  magnificent  dedication  required,  moving  with  a  stately 
»nd  measured  solemnity,  and  putting  forward  some  majes- 
•ic  pretensions,  arising  out  of  a  long  and  laborious  life ; 


424 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES 


were  a  pleading  required  against  some  capital  abuse  of  the 
earth  —  war,  slavery,  oppression  in  its  thousand  forms; 
were  a  Defensio  pro  Populo  Anglicano  required  ;  Southey's 
is  not  the  mind,  and,  by  a  necessary  consequence,  Southey's 
is  not  the  style,  for  carrying  such  purposes  into  full  and 
memorable  eflfect.  His  style  is  therefore  good,  because 
it  has  been  suited  to  his  themes  ;  and  those  themes  have 
hitherto  been  either  narrative,  which  usually  imposes  a 
modest  diction,  and  a  modest  structure  of  sentences,  or 
argumentative  in  that  class  which  is  too  overburthened 
with  details,  with  replies,  with  interruption,  and  every 
mode  of  discontinuity,  to  allow  a  thought  of  eloquence, 
or  of  the  periodic  style  which  a  perfect  eloquence  instinc- 
tively seeks. 

I  here  close  my  separate  notice  of  the  Lake  Poets  — 
meaning  those  three  who  were  originally  so  denominated 
—  three  men  upon  whom  posterity,  in  every  age,  will 
look  back  with  interest  as  profound  as,  perhaps,  belongs 
to  any  other  names  of  our  era ;  for  it  happens,  not  unfre- 
quently,  that  the  'personal  interest  in  the  author  is  not  in 
the  direct  ratio  of  that  which  belongs  to  his  works :  and 
the  character  of  an  author,  better  qualified  to  com_mand  a 
vast  popularity  for  the  creations  of  his  pen,  is  oftentimes 
more  of  a  universal  character,  less  peculiar,  less  fitted  to 
stimulate  the  curiosity,  or  to  sustain  the  sympathy  of  the 
intellectual,  than  the  profounder  and  more  ascetic  solem- 
nity of  a  Wordsworth,  or  the  prodigal  and  magnificent 
eccentricities  of  a  Coleridge.  With  respect  to  both  of 
these  gifted  men,  some  interesting  notices  still  remain  in 
arrear ;  but  these  will  more  properly  come  forward  in  their 
uatural  places,  as  they  happen  to  arise  in  after  years  in 
connection  with  my  own  memoirs. 


RECOLLECTIOKS  OF  OBASMEBS!. 


425 


CHAPTER  X. 

RECOLLECTIONS  OF  GRASMERE. 

I  Jiow  resume  my  memoirs,  from  the  moment  of  my 
leaving  Wordsworth's  cottage,  after  one  week  of  delight- 
ful intercourse  with  him  and  his  sister,  about  the  twelfth 
of  November,  1807. 

Soon  after  my  return  to  Oxford,  I  received  a  letter  from 
Miss  Wordsworth,  asking  for  any  subscriptions  I  might 
FTjcceed  in  obtaining,  amongst  my  college  friends,  in  aid 
^f  the  funds  then  raising  in  behalf  of  an  orphan  family, 
who  had  become  such  by  an  affecting  tragedy  that  had 
occurred  within  a  few  weeks  from  my  visit  to  Grasmere. 

This  calamitous  incident,  interesting  for  itself  as  well 
as  for  having  drawn  forth  some  beautiful  stanzas  from 
Wordsworth,  had  a  separate  and  peculiar  importance  in 
reference  to  my  own  life  —  having  been  the  remote  occa- 
sion of  another  misfortune  that  brought  to  myself  the  first 
deep  draught  from  the  cup  of  sorrow  which  it  was  des- 
tined that  I  should  drink.  Miss  Wordsworth  drew  up  a 
brief  memoir  of  the  whole  affair.  This,  I  believe,  went 
into  the  hands  of  the  royal  family ;  at  any  rate,  the 
august  ladies  of  that  house  (all  or  some  of  them)  were 
amongst  the  many  subscribers  to  the  orphan  children ; 
and  it  must  be  satisfactory  to  all  who  shared,  and  happen 
to  recollect  their  own  share  in  that  seasonable  work  of 
lAarity,  that  the  money  then  collected  under  the  auspices 
of  the  Wordsworths,  proved  sufficient,  with  judicious 


126 


LUtERARY  REMINISCENCEtS. 


administration  and  superintendence  from  a  committee  of 
the  neighboring  ladies  in  Ambleside,  to  educate  and  settle 
respectably,  in  useful  callings,  the  whole  of  a  very  large 
family,  not  one  of  whom,  to  my  knowledge,  has  farea 
otherwise  than  prosperously,  or,  to  speak  of  th?  very  low- 
est case,  decently  in  their  subsequent  lives  as  :r*?n  and 
women,  long  since  surrounded  by  children  of  their  own. 
Miss  Wordsworth's  simple  but  fervid  memoir  not  being 
within  my  reach  at  this  moment,  I  must  trust  to  my  own 
recollections  and  my  own  less  personal  impressions  t^ 
retrace  the  story ;  which,  after  all,  is  not  much  of  a  stor) 
to  excite  or  to  impress,  unless  for  those  who  can  find  a 
sufiicient  interest  in  the  trials  and  unhappy  fate  of  hard- 
working peasants,  and  can  reverence  the  fortitude  which, 
^eing  lodged  in  so  frail  a  tenement  as  the  person  of  a  little 
^irl,  not  much,  if  anything,  above  nine  years  old,  could 
iace  an  occasion  of  sudden  mysterious  abandonment  —  of 
uncertain  peril  —  and  could  tower  up,  during  one  night, 
into  the  perfect  energies  of  womanhood  —  energies  unsus- 
pected even  by  herself —  under  the  mere  pressure  of  diffi- 
culty, and  the  sense  of  new-born  responsibilities  awfully 
bequeathed  to  her,  and  in  the  most  lonely,  perhaps,  of  all 
English  habitations. 

The  little  valley  of  Easedale,  which,  and  the  neighbor- 
hood of  which,  were  the  scenes  of  these  interesting  events, 
is,  on  its  own  account,  one  of  the  most  impressive  soli- 
tudes amongst  the  mountains  of  the  lake  district ;  and  I 
must  pause  to  describe  it.  Easedale  is  impressive,  Jirsty 
as  a  solitude  ;  for  the  depth  of  the  seclusion  is  brought 
out  and  forced  more  pointedly  upon  the  feelings  by  the 
thin  scattering  of  houses  over  its  sides,  and  the  surface  o^ 
what  may  be  called  its  floor.  These  are  not  above  five  ox 
lix  at  the  most ;  and  one,  the  remotest  of  the  whole,  wa/ 
untenanted  for  all  the  thirty  years  of  my  acquaintancr 


RECOLLECTIONS  OF  GRASMERE. 


427 


with  the  place.  Secondly,  it  is  impressive  from  the  exces- 
sive loveliness  which  adorns  its  little  area.  This  is  broken 
up  into  small  fields  and  miniature  meadows,  separated  not 
—  as  too  often  happens,  with  sad  injury  to  the  beauty  of 
the  lake  country  —  by  stone  walls,  but  sometimes  by  little 
hedge-rows,  sometimes  by  little  sparkling,  pebbly  '  beck,' 
lustrous  to  the  very  bottom,  and  not  too  broad  for  a  child's 
flying  leap  ;  and  sometimes  by  wild  self-sown  woodlands 
of  birch,  alder,  holly,  mountain  ash,  and  hazel,  that  mean- 
der through  the  valley,  intervening  the  different  estates 
with  natural  sylvan  marches,  and  giving  cheerfulness  in 
winter,  by  the  bright  scarlet  of  their  barrier.  It  is  the 
character  of  all  the  northern  English  valleys,  as  I  have 
already  remarked  —  and  it  is  a  character  first  noticed  by 
Wordsworth  —  that  they  assume,  in  their  bottom  areas, 
the  level  floor-like  shape,  making  everywhere  a  direct 
angle  with  the  surrounding  hills,  and  definitely  marking 
out  the  margin  of  their  outlines  ;  whereas  the  Welsh  val- 
leys have  too  often  the  glaring  imperfection  of  the  basin 
shape,  which  allows  no  sense  of  any  absolute  valley  sur- 
face ;  the  hills  are  already  commencing  at  the  very  centre 
of  what  is  called  the  level  area.  The  little  valley  of 
Easedale  is,  in  this  respect,  as  highly  finished  as  in  every 
other  ;  and  in  the  Westmoreland  spring,  which  may  be 
considered  May  and  the  earlier  half  of  June,  whilst  the 
grass  in  the  meadows  is  yet  short  from  the  habit  of  keep- 
ing the  sheep  on  it  until  a  much  later  period  than  elsewhere, 
(viz.  until  the  mountains  are  so  far  cleared  of  snow,  and 
the  probability  of  storms,  as  to  make  it  safe  to  send  them 
out  on  their  summer  migration,)  the  little  fields  of  Ease- 
dale  have  the  most  lawny  appearance,  and  from  the 
humidity  of  the  Westmoreland    climate,  the  most  verdant 

*  It  *s  pretty  generally  known,  perhaps,  that  Westmoreland  and 
Devonshire  are  the  two  rainiest  counties  in  England.    At  Kirkby^ 


428 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


that  it  is  possible  to  imagine ;  and  on  a  gentle  vernal  day 
—  when  vegetation  has  been  far  enough  advanced  to  bring 
out  ♦he  leaves,  an  April  sun  gleaming  coyly  through  the 
clouds,  and  genial  April  rain  gently  pencilling  the  light 
spray  of  the  wood  with  tiny  pearl  drops  —  I  have  often 
thought,  whilst  looking  with  silent  admiration  upon  this 
exquisite  composition,  of  landscape,  vvith  its  miniature 
fields  running  up  like  forest  glades  into  miniature  woods  ; 
its  little  columns  of  smoke,  breathing  up  like  incense  to 
the  household  gods,  from  the  hearths  of  two  or  three  pic« 
turesque  cottages  —  abodes  of  simple  primitive  manners, 
and  what,  from  personal  knowledge,  I  will  call  humble 
virtue  —  whilst  my  eyes  rested  on  this  charming  combina- 
tion of  lawns  and  shrubberies,  I  have  thought  that  if  a 
scene  on  this  earth  could  deserve  to  be  sealed  up,  like  the 
valley  of  Rasselas,  against  the  intrusion  of  the  world  — 
if  there  were  one  to  which  a  man  would  willingly  surren- 
der himself  a  prisoner  for  the  years  of  a  long  life  —  that 
it  is  this  Easedale  —  which  would  justify  the  choice,  and 
recompense  the  sacrifice.  But  there  is  a  third  advantage 
possessed  by  this  Easedale,  above  other  rival  valleys,  in 
the  sublimity  of  its  mountain  barriers.  In  one  of  its  many 
rocky  recesses  is  seen  a  '  force,'  (such  is  the  local  name 
for  a  cataract,)  white  with  foam,  descending  at  all  seasons 
with  respectable  strength,  and,  after  the  melting  of  snows, 
with  an  Alpine  violence.  Follow  the  leading  of  this 
'  force '  for  three  quarters  of  a  mile,  and  you  come  to  a 
little  mountain  lake,  locally  termed  a  '  tarn,'     the  very 

Lonsdale,  lying  just  on  the  outer  margin  of  the  Lake  district,  one-fifth 
more  rain  is  computed  to  fall  than  in  the  adjacent  counties  on  the 
eame  side  of  England.  But  it  is  also  notorious,  that  the  western  side 
of  the  island  universally  is  more  rainy  than  the  east.  Collins  calls 
it  the  Sliowery  West. 

*  A  tarn  is  a  lake,  generally  (indeed  always)  a  small  one  :  and 
%lways,  as  I  think  (but  this  I  have  heard  disputed)  lying  above  the 


BJBCOLLECTIONS  OF  GRASMEBE. 


429 


finest  and  most  gloomy  sublime  of  its  class.  From  this 
tarn  it  was,  1  doubt  not,  though  appl}dng  it  to  another, 
that  Wordsworth  drew  the  circumstances  of  his  general 
description  :  — 

*  Ihither  the  rainbow  comes,  the  cloud. 
And  mists  that  spread  the  flying  shroud ; 

And  winds 
That,  if  they  could,  would  hurry  past : 
But  that  enormous  barrier  binds  it  fast. 

&c.  &c.  &o. 

The  rocks  repeat  the  raven's  croak. 
In  symphony  austere,' 

And  far  beyond  this  '  enormous  barrier,'  that  thus  imprisons 
thi3  very  winds,  tower  upwards  the  aspiring  heads  (usually 
enveloped  in  cloud  and  mist)  of  Glaramara,  Bow  Fell, 
and  the  other  fells  of  Langdale  Head  and  Borrowdale. 
Finally,  superadded  to  the  other  circumstances  of  solitude, 
arising  out  of  the  rarity  of  human  life,  and  of  the  signs 
which  mark  the  goings  on  of  human  life  —  two  other  acci- 
dents there  are  of  Easedale,  which  sequester  it  from  the 
world,  and  intensify  its  depth  of  solitude  beyond  what 
could  well  be  looked  for  or  thought  possible  in  any  vale 
within  a  district  so  beaten  by  modern  tourists.  One  is, 
that  it  is  a  chamber  within  a  chamber,  or  rather  a  closet 
within  a  chamber  —  a  chapel  within  a  cathedral  —  a  little 
private  oratory  within  a  chapel.  For  Easedale  is,  in  fact, 
a  depende^icy  of  Grasmere  —  a  little  recess  lying  within 
the  same  general  basin  of  mountains,  but  partitioned  off 
by  a  screen  of  rock  and  swelling  uplands,  so  inconsidera- 

»2vel  of  the  inhabited  valleys  and  the  large  lakes;  and  subject  to  this 
further  condition,  as  first  noticed  by  Wordsworth,  that  it  has  no  main 
^eder.  Now,  this  latter  accident  of  the  tarn  at  once  explains  and 
authenticates  my  account  of  the  word,  viz.  —  that  it  is  the  Danish  word 
taaren,  (a  trickling  ;)  a  deposit  of  waters  from  the  weeping  of  raio 
down  the  smooth  faces  of  the  rocks. 


430 


LITERARY  EEJVIINISC  ENCES. 


ble  in  height,  that,  when  surveyed  from  the  commanding 
summits  of  Fairfield  or  Seat  Sandal,  they  seem  to  subside 
into  the  level  area,  and  melt  into  the  general  surface. 
But,  viewed  from  below,  these  petty  heights  form  a  suffi- 
cient partition  ;  which  is  pierced,  however,  in  two  points 
—  once  by  the  little  murmuring  brook  threading  its  silvery 
line  onwards  to  the  lake  of  Grasmere,  and  again  by  a  little 
rough  lane,  barely  capable  (and  I  think  not  capable  in  all 
points)  of  receiving  a  post-chaise.  This  little  lane  keeps 
ascending  amongst  wooded  steeps  for  a  quarter  of  a  mile  ; 
and  then,  by  a  downward  course  of  a  hundred  yards  or  so, 
brings  you  to  a  point  at  which  the  little  valley  suddenly 
bursts  upon  you  with  as  full  a  revelation  of  its  tiny  propor- 
tions, as  the  traversing  of  the  wooded  back-grounds  will 
permit.  The  lane  carries  you  at  last  to  a  little  wooden 
bridge,  practicable  for  pedestrians ;  but,  for  carriages, 
even  the  doubtful  road,  already  mentioned,  ceases  alto- 
gether :  and  this  fact,  coupled  with  the  difficulty  of  sus- 
pecting such  a  lurking  paradise  from  the  high  road  through 
Grasmere,  at  every  point  of  which  the  little  hilly  partition 
crowds  up  into  one  mass  with  the  capital  barriers  in  the 
rear,  seeming,  in  fact,  not  so  much  to  blend  with  them  as 
to  be  a  part  of  them,  may  account  for  the  fortunate  neg- 
lect of  Easedale  in  the  tourist's  route  ;  and  also  because 
there  is  no  one  separate  object,  such  as  a  lake  or  a  splen- 
did cataract,  to  bribe  the  interest  of  those  who  are  hunting 
after  sights ;  for  the  '  force '  is  comparatively  small,  and 
the  tarn  is  beyond  the  limits  of  the  vale,  as  well  as  difficult 
of  approach. 

one  other  circumstance  there  is  about  Easedale,  which 
completes  its  demarcation,  and  makes  it  as  entirely  a  land- 
locked little  park,  within  a  ring-fence  of  mountains,  as 
ever  human  art,  if  rendered  capable  of  dealing  with 
mountains  and  their  arrangement,  could  have  contrived 


KECOLLECTIONS  OF  GRASMEBE. 


481 


The  sole  approach,  as  I  have  mentioned,  is  from  Gras- 
mere  ;  and  some  one  outlet  there  must  inevitably  be  in 
every  vale  that  can  be  interesting  to  a  human  occupant, 
since  without  water  it  would  not  be  habitable ;  and  running 
w^ater  must  force  an  exit  for  itself,  and,  consequently,  an 
inlet  for  the  world ;  but,  properly  speaking,  there  is  no 
other.  For,  when  you  explore  the  remoter  end  of  the 
vale,  at  which  you  suspect  some  communication  with  the 
world  outside,  you  find  before  you  a  most  formidable 
amount  of  climbing,  the  extent  of  which  can  hardly  be 
measured  where  there  is  no  solitary  object  of  human  work- 
manship or  vestige  of  animal  life,  not  a  sheep-track  even, 
not  a  shepherd's  hovel,  but  rock  and  heath,  heath  and 
rock,  tossed  about  in  monotonous  confusion.  And,  after 
the  ascent  is  mastered,  you  descend  into  a  second  vale  — 
long,  narrow,  sterile,  known  by  the  name  of  '  Far  Ease- 
dale  :  *  from  which  point,  if  you  could  drive  a  tunnel 
below  the  everlasting  hills,  perhaps  six  or  seven  miles 
might  bring  you  to  the  nearest  habitation  of  man,  in  Bor- 
rowdale ;  but,  crossing  the  mountains,  the  road  cannot  be 
less  than  twelve  or  fourteen,  and,  in  point  of  fatigue,  at  the 
least  twenty.  This  long  valley,  which  is  really  terrific  at 
noon-day,  from  its  utter  loneliness  and  desolation,  com- 
pletes the  defences  of  little  sylvan  Eased  ale.  There  is 
one  door  into  it  from  the  Grasmere  side  ;  but  that  door  is 
hidden ;  and  on  every  other  quarter  there  is  no  door  at  all, 
nor  any,  the  roughest,  access,  but  what  w^ould  demand  a 
day's  walking. 

Such  is  the  solitude  —  so  deep,  so  seventimes  guarded, 
and  so  rich  in  miniature  beauty  —  of  Easedale  ;  and  in 
this  solitude  it  was  that  George  and  Sarah  Green,  tw^o 
poor  and  hard-working  peasants,  dwelt,  with  a  numeroua 
family  of  small  children.  Poor  as  they  were,  they  had 
won  the  general  respect  of  the  neighborhood,  from  the 


432 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


'incomplaining  firmness  with  whicli  they  hore  the  hard* 
ships  of  their  lot,  and  from  the  decent  attire  in  which  the 
good  mother  of  the  family  contrived  to  send  out  her 
children  to  the  Grasmere  school.  It  is  a  custom,  and  a 
rery  ancient  one,  in  W  estmoreland  —  and  1  have  seen  the 
^ame  usage  prevailing  in  southern  Scotland  —  that  any 
sale  by  auction,  whether  of  cattle,  of  farming  produce, 
farming  stock,  wood,  or  household  furniture  —  and  seldom 
a  fortnight  passes  without  something  of  the  sort  —  forms 
an  excuse  for  the  good  women,  throughout  the  whole 
circumference  of  perhaps  a  dozen  valleys,  to  assemble  at 
the  place  of  sale  with  the  nominal  purpose  of  aiding  the 
sale,  or  of  buying  something  they  may  happen  to  want. 
No  doubt  the  real  business  of  the  sale  attracts  numbers  ; 
although  of  late  years  —  that  is,  for  the  last  twenty-five 
years,  through  which  so  many  sales  of  furniture  the  most 
expensive,  (hastily  made  by  casual  settlers,  on  the  wing 
for  some  fresher  novelty,)  —  have  made  this  particular 
article  almost  a  drug  in  the  country  ;  and  the  interest  in 
such  sales  has  greatly  declined.  But,  in  1807,  this  fever 
of  founding  villas  or  cottages  ornees,  was  yet  only 
beginning  ;  and  a  sale,  except  it  were  of  the  sort  exclu- 
sively interesting  to  farming  men,  was  a  kind  of  general 
intimation  to  the  country,  from  the  owner  of  the  property, 
that  he  would,  on  that  afternoon,  be  '  at  home '  for  all 
comers,  and  hoped  to  see  as  large  an  attendance  as 
possible.  Accordingly,  it  was  the  almost  invariable 
custom  —  and  often,  too,  when  the  parties  were  far  too 
poor  for  such  an  efibrt  of  hospitality  —  to  make  ample 
provision,  not  of  eatables,  but  of  liquor,  for  all  who  came. 
Even  a  gentleman,  who  should  happen  to  present  himself 
on  such  a  festal  occasion,  by  way  of  seeing  the  '  humors  * 
of  the  scene,  was  certain  of  meeting  the  most  cordial 
welcome.    The  good  woman  of  the  house  more  particu- 


KEC'"LLECTIC^"S  OF  GRASMERE. 


433 


larly  testified  her  sense  of  the  honor  done  to  her  house, 
and  was  sure  to  seek  out  some  cherished  and  solitary 
article  of  china  —  a  wreck  from  a  century  back  —  in 
order  that  he,  being  a  porcelain  man  amongst  so  many 
deaf  men  and  women,  might  have  a  porcelain  cup  to 
drink  from. 

The  main  secret  of  attraction  at  these  sales  —  many  a 
score  of  which  I  have  attended  —  was  the  social  rendez- 
vous thus  effected  between  parties  so  remote  from  each 
other,  (either  by  real  distance,  or  by  the  virtual  distance 
which  results  from  a  separation  by  difficult  tracts  of  hilly 
country,)  that,  in  fact,  without  some  such  common  object, 
and  oftentimes  something  like  a  bisection  of  the  interval 
between  them,  they  would  not  be  likely  to  hear  of  each 
other  for  months,  or  actually  to  meet  for  years.  This 
principal  charm  of  the  '  gathering,'  seasoned,  doubtless, 
to  many  by  the  certain  anticipation  that  the  whole  budget 
of  rural  scandal  would  then  and  there  be  opened,  was  not' 
assuredly  diminished  to  the  men  by  the  anticipation  of 
excellent  ale,  (usually  brewed  six  or  seven  weeks  before, 
in  preparation  for  the  event,)  and  possibly  of  still  more 
excellent  pow-sowdy,  (a  combination  of  ale,  spirits,  and 
spices ;)  nor  to  the  women  by  some  prospect,  not  so 
inevitably  fulfilled,  but  pretty  certain  in  a  liberal  house, 
of  communicating  their  news  over  excellent  tea.  Even 
the  auctioneer  was  always  '  part  and  parcel '  of  the 
mirth  :  he  was  always  a  rustic  old  humorist,  a  '  character,' 
and  a  jovial  drunkard,  privileged  in  certain  good-humored 
liberties  and  jokes  with  all  bidders,  gentle  or  simple,  and 
furnished  with  an  ancient  inheritance  of  jests  appropriate 
to  the  articles  ofiered  for  sale — jests  that  had,  doubtless, 
done  their  office  from  Elizabeth's  golden  days  ;  but  no 
more,  on  that  account,  failed  of  their  expected  effect, 
>^ith  either  man  or  woman  of  this  nineteenth  century, 
28 


434 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


than  the  sun  fails  to  gladden  the  heart  because  it  is  that 
Bame  old  obsolete  sun  that  has  gladdened  it  for  thousands 
of  years. 

One  thing,  however,  in  mere  justice  to  the  poor  in* 
digenous  Dalesmen  of  Westmoreland  and  Cumberland, 
I  am  bound,  in  this  place,  to  record,  that,  often  as  I  have 
been  at  these  sales,  and  through  many  a  year  before  even 
a  scattering  of  gentry  began  to  attend,  yet  so  true  to  the 
natural  standard  of  politeness  was  the  decorum  uniformly 
maintained,  even  the  old  buffoon  (as  sometimes  he  was) 
of  an  auctioneer  never  forgot  himself  so  far  as  to  found 
upon  any  article  of  furniture  a  jest  that  could  have  called 
up  a  painful  blush  in  any  woman's  face.  He  might,  per- 
haps, go  so  far  as  to  awaken  a  little  rosy  confusion  upon 
some  young  bride's  countenance,  when  pressing  a  cradle 
upon  her  attention  :  but  never  did  I  hear  him  utter,  nor 
would  he  have  been  tolerated  in  uttering  a  scurrilous  or 
disgusting  jest,  such  as  might  easily  have  been  suggested 
by  something  offered  at  a  household  sale.  Such  jests  as 
these  I  heard  for  the  first  time,  at  a  sale  in  Grasmere 
in  1814 ;  and,  I  am  ashamed  to  say  it,  from  some 
*  gentlemen  '  of  a  great  city.  And  it  grieved  me  to  see 
the  effect,  as  it  expressed  itself  upon  the  manly  faces  of 
the  grave  Dalesmen  —  a  sense  of  insult  offered  to  their 
women,  who  met  in  confiding  reliance  upon  the  forbear- 
ance of  the  men,  and  upon  their  regard  for  the  dignity  of 
the  female  sex,  this  feeling  struggling  with  the  habitual 
respect  they  are  inclined  to  show  towards  what  they 
suppose  gentle  blood  and  superior  education.  Taken 
generally,  however,  these  were  the  most  picturesque  and 
festal  meetings  which  the  manners  of  the  country  pro- 
duced. There  you  saw  all  ages  and  both  sexes  assem- 
bled :  there  you  saw  old  men  whose  heads  would  have 
been  studies  for  Guido  ;  there  you  saw  the  most  colossal 


BECOLLECTIONS  OF  GRASMi^RE. 


4o5 


md  stately  figures  amongst  the  young  men  tliat  Eng- 
land has  to  show  ;  there  the  most  beautiful  young  women, 
Thera  it  was  that  sometimes  I  saw  a  lovelier  face  than 
ever  I  shall  see  again  :  there  it  was  that  local  peculiarities 
of  usage  or  of  language  were  best  to  be  studied  ;  there  — 
at  least  iu  the  earlier  years  of  my  residence  in  that  district 
—  that  the  social  benevolence,  the  grave  wisdom,  the 
innocent  mirth,  and  the  neighborly  kindness  of  the  people, 
most  delightfully  expanded  and  expressed  themselves  with 
the  least  reserve. 

To  such  a  scene  it  was,  to  a  sale  of  domestic  furniture 
at  the  house  of  some  proprietor  on  the  point  of  giving  up 
housekeeping,  perhaps  in  order  to  live  with  a  married  son 
or  daughter,  that  George  and  Sarah  Green  set  forward  in 
the  forenoon  of  a  day  fated  to  be  their  last  on  earth. 
The  sale  was  to  take  place  in  Langdale  Head ;  to  which, 
from  their  own  cottage  in  Easedale,  it  was  possible  in 
daylight,  and  supposing  no  mist  upon  the  hills,  to  find  out 
a  short  cut  of  not  more  than  eight  miles.  By  this  route 
they  went  ;  and  notwithstanding  the  snow  lay  on  the 
ground,  they  reached  their  destination  in  safety.  The 
attendance  at  the  sale  must  have  been  diminished  by  the 
rigorous  state  of  the  weather ;  but  still  the  scene  was  a 
gay  one  as  usual.  Sarah  Green,  though  a  good  and 
worthy  woman  in  her  maturer  years,  had  been  imprudent 
and  —  as  the  tender  consideration  of  the  country  is  apt  to 
express  it  — '  unfortunate  '  in  her  youth.  She  had  an 
elder  daughter  who  was  illegitimate  ;  and  I  believe  the 
father  of  this  girl  was  dead.  The  girl  herself  was  grown 
p  ;  and  the  peculiar  solicitude  ^f  poor  Sarah's  maternal 
heart  was  at  this  time  called  forth  on  her  behalf ;  she 
wished  to  see  her  placed  in  a  very  respectable  house, 
where  the  mistress  was  distinguished  for  her  notable 
qualities  and  her  success  in  forming  good  servants.  This 


436 


LITEEARY  KEMINISCENCES. 


object,  so  im  ortant  to  Sarah  Green  in  the  narrow  range 
of  t  cr  cares,  as  in  a  more  exalted  family  it  might  be  to 
obtain  a  ship  for  a  lieutenant  that  had  passed  as  master 
and  commander,  or  to  get  him  '  posted  '  —  occupied  her 
almost  throughout  the  sale.  A  doubtful  answer  had  been 
given  to  her  application  ;  and  Sarah  was  going  about  the 
crowd,  and  weaving  her  person  in  and  out  in  order  to  lay 
hold  of  this  or  that  intercessor,  who  might  have,  or  might 
seem  to  have,  some  weight  with  the  principal  person 
concerned. 

This  was  the  last  occupation  which  is  known  to  have 
stirred  the  pulses  of  her  heart.  An  illegitimate  child  is 
everywhere,  even  in  the  indulgent  society  of  Westmore- 
land Dalesmen,  under  some  shade  of  discountenance^;  so 
that  Sarah  Green  might  consider  her  duty  to  be  the 
stronger  toward  the  child  of  her  '  misfortune.'  And  she 
probably  had  another  reason  for  her  anxiety  —  as  some 
words  dropped  by  her  on  this  evening  led  people  to 
presume  —  in  her  conscientious  desire  to  introduce  her 
daughter  into  a  situation  less  perilous  than  that  which  had 
compassed  her  own  youthful  steps  with  snares.  If  so,  it 
is  painful  to  know  that  the  virtuous  wish,  whose 

 *  vital  warmth 

Gave  the  last  human  motion  to  the  heart,' 

should  not  have  been  fulfilled.  She  was  a  woman  of 
ardent  and  affectionate  spirit,  of  which  Miss  Wordsworth's 
memoir,  or  else  her  subsequent  memorials  in  conversa- 
tion, (I  forget  which,)  gave  some  circumstantial  and 
affecting  instances,  which  I  cannot  now  recall  with 
accuracy.  This  ardor  it  was,  and  her  impassioned 
manner,  that  drew  attention  to  what  she  did ;  for  other- 
wise, she  was  too  poor  a  person  to  be  important  in  the 
estimation  of  strangers,  and,  of  all  possible  situations,  to 
\e  important  at  a  sale,  where  the  public  attention  was 


RECOLLECIIONS  OF  ORASMEBE. 


437 


naturally  fixed  upon  the  chief  purchasers,  and  the  atten- 
tion of  the  purchasers  upon  the  chief  competitors. 
Hence  it  happened,  that,  after  she  ceased  to  challenge 
notice  by  the  emphasis  of  her  solicitations  for  her 
daughter,  she  ceased  to  be  noticed  at  all ;  and  nothing 
was  recollected  of  her  subsequent  behavior  until  the  time 
arrived  for  general  separation.  This  time  was  considera- 
bly after  sunset ;  and  the  final  recollections  of  the  crowd 
with  respect  to  George  and  Sarah  Green,  were,  that,  upon 
their  intention  being  understood  to  retrace  their  morning 
path  and  to  attempt  the  perilous  task  of  dropping  down 
into  Easedale  from  the  mountains  above  Langdale  Head, 
a  sound  of  remonstrance  arose  from  many  quarters 
However,  at  a  moment  when  everybody  was  in  the  hurry 
of  departure  —  and,  to  persons  of  their  mature  age,  the 
opposition  could  not  be  very  obstinate —  party  after  party 
rode  off;  the  meeting  melted  away,  or,  as  the  northern 
phrase  is,  scaled  ;  ^  and,  at  length,  nobody  was  left  of 
any  weight  that  could  pretend  to  influence  the  decision  of 
elderly  people.  They  quitted  the  scene,  professing  to 
obey  some  advice  or  other  upon  the  choice  of  roads  ;  but, 
at  as  early  a  point  as  they  could  do  so  unobserved,  began 
to  ascend  the  hills,  everywhere  open  from  the  rude 
carriage  way.  After  this,  they  were  seen  no  more. 
They  had  disappeared  into  the  cloud  of  death.  Voices 
were  heard  some  hours  afterwards,  from  the  mountains 
—  voices,  as  some  thought,  of  alarm  ;  others  said,  no  — 
that  it  was  only  the  voices  of  jovial  people,  carried  by  the 

*  Scaled  —  &cale  is  a  verb  both  active  and  neuter.  I  use  it  here 
fcs  a  neuter  verb,  in  the  sense  (a  Cumberland  sense)  of  separating  to 
ftU  the  thirty-two  points  of  the  compass.  But  by  Shakspeare  it  is 
used  in  an  active  or  transitive  sense.  Speaking  of  some  secret  news, 
he  says— -'We'll  scale  it  a  little  more,'  i.e,  spread  it  in  all  direo 
tions. 


L3S 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


wind  into  uncertain  regions.  The  result  was,  that  no 
attention  was  paid  to  the  sounds. 

That  night,  in  little  peaceful  Easedale,  six  children  sat 
by  a  peat  fire,  expecting  the  return  of  their  parents,  upon 
whom  they  depended  for  their  daily  bread.  Let  a  day 
pass,  and  they  were  starved.  Every  sound  was  heard  with 
anxiety ;  for  all  this  was  reported  many  a  hundred  times 
to  Miss  Wordsworth,  and  those  who,  like  myself,  were 
never  wearied  of  hearing  the  details.  Every  sound, 
every  echo  amongst  the  hills  was  listened  to  for  five 
hours  —  from  seven  to  twelve.  At  length,  the  eldest 
girl  of  the  family  —  about  nine  years  old  —  told  her  little 
brothers  and  sisters  to  go  to  bed.  They  had  been  taught 
obedience ;  and  all  of  them,  at  the  voice  of  their  eldest 
sister,  went  off  fearfully  to  their  beds.  What  could  be 
their  fears,  it  is  difficult  to  say !  they  had  no  knowledge 
to  instruct  them  in  the  dangers  of  the  hills  ;  but  the  eldest 
sister,  always  averred  that  they  had  a  deep  solicitude,  as 
she  herself  had,  about  their  parents.  Doubtless  she  had 
communicated  her  fears  to  them.  Some  time,  in  the 
course  of  the  evening  —  but  it  was  late  and  after  mid- 
night —  the  moon  arose  and  shed  a  torrent  of  light  upon 
the  Langdale  fells,  which  had  already,  long  hours  before 
witnessed  in  darkness  the  death  of  their  parents.  It  maj 
be  well  here  to  cite  Mr.  Wordsworth's  stanzas  :  — 

*  Who  weeps  for  strangers  ?    Many  wept 
For  George  and  Sarah  Green ; 
Wept  for  that  pair's  unhappy  fate. 
Whose  graves  may  here  be  seen. 

By  night  upon  these  stormy  fells, 

Did  wife  and  husband  roam; 
Six  little  ones  at  home  had  left, 

And  could  not  find  that  home. 


BECOIiLECTIONS  OF  GRASMESE, 


139 


For  any  dwelling-place  of  man 

As  vainly  did  they  seek. 
He  perished ;  and  a  voice  was  heard  — 

The  widow's  lonely  shriek. 

Not  many  steps,  and  she  was  left 

A  body  without  life  — 
A  few  short  steps  were  the  chain  that  bound 

The  husband  to  the  wife. 

Now  do  these  sternly-featured  hills 

Look  gently  on  this  grave; 
And  quiet  now  are  the  depths  of  air. 

As  a  sea  without  a  wave. 

But  deeper  lies  the  heart  of  peace 

In  quiet  more  profound; 
The  heart  of  quietness  is  here 

Within  this  churchyard  bound. 

And  from  all  agony  of  mind 

It  keeps  them  safe,  and  far 
From  fear  and  grief,  and  from  all  need 

Of  swn  or  guiding  star. 

0  darkness  of  the  grave  !  how  deep. 

After  that  living  night  — 
lliat  last  and  dreary  living  one 

Of  sorrow  and  affright ! 

0  sacred  marriage  bed  of  death, 

That  keeps  them  side  by  side 
In  bond  of  peace,  in  bond  of  love, 

That  may  not  be  untied  ! ' 

That  night,  and  the  following  morning,  came  a  further 
and  a  heavier  fall  of  snow  ;  in  consequence  of  which  the 
poor  children  were  completely  imprisoned,  and  cut  off 
from  all  possibility  of  communicating  with  their  next 
neighbors.  The  brook  was  too  much  for  them  to  leap  ; 
and  the  little,  crazy,  wooden  bridge  could  not  be  crossed 
;r  even  approached  with  safety,  from  the  drifting  of  the 


440 


LITERARY  KEMINISCENCES- 


pnow  having  made  it  impossible  to  ascertain  the  exact 
situation  of  some  treacherous  hole  in  its  timbers,  which, 
if  trod  upon,  would  have  let  a  small  child  drop  through 
into  the  rapid  waters.  Their  parents  did  not  return.  For 
some  hours  of  the  morning,  the  children  clung  to  the 
hope  that  the  extreme  severity  of  the  night  had  tempted 
them  to  sleep  in  Langdale  ;  but  this  hope  forsook  them  as 
the  day  wore  away.  Their  father,  George  Green,  had 
served  as  a  soldier,  and  was  an  active  man,  of  ready 
resources,  who  would  not,  under  any  circumstances,  have 
failed  to  force  a  road  back  to  his  family,  had  he  been 
still  living  ;  and  this  reflection,  or  rather  semi-conscious 
feeling,  w^hich  the  awfulness  of  their  situation  forced 
upon  the  minds  of  all  but  the  mere  infants,  taught  them 
to  feel  the  extremity  of  their  danger.  Wonderful  it  is  to 
see  the  effect  of  sudden  misery,  sudden  grief,  or  sudden 
fear,  (where  they  do  not  utterly  upset  the  faculties,)  in 
sharpening  the  intellectual  perceptions.  Instances  must 
have  fallen  in  the  way  of  most  of  us.  And  I  have  noticed 
frequently  that  even  sudden  and  intense  bodily  pain  is 
part  of  the  machinery  employed  by  nature  for  quickening 
the  development  of  the  mind.  The  perceptions  of  in- 
fants are  not,  in  fact,  excited  gradatim  and  continuously, 
but  per  saltum,  and  by  unequal  starts.  At  least,  in  the 
case  of  my  own  children,  one  and  all,  I  have  remarked, 
that,  after  any  very  severe  fit  of  those  peculiar  pains  to 
which  the  delicate  digestive  organs  of  most  infants  are 
liable,  there  always  become  apparent  on  the  following  day 
a  very  considerable  increase  of  vital  energy  and  of  viva- 
cious attention  to  the  objects  around  them.  The  poor 
desolate  children  of  Blentarn  Ghyll,*  hourly  becoming 

♦Wordsworth's  conjecture  as  to  the  origin  of  the  name  is  proba- 
bly the  true  one.    There  is  at  a  little  elevation  above  the  place,  9k 


RECOLLECTIONS  OF  GRASMEEE. 


441 


more  rufefuHy  convinced  that  they  were  orphans,  gave 
many  evidences  of  this  awaking  power,  as  lodged,  by  a 
providential  arrangement,  in  situations  of  trial  that  most 
require  it.  They  huddled  together,  in  the  evening,  round 
their  hearth-fire  of  peats,  and  held  their  little  councils 
upon  what  was  to  be  done  towards  any  chance  —  if  chance 
remained  —  of  yet  giving  aid  to  their  parents ;  for  a 
slender  hope  had  sprung  up  that  some  hovel  or  sheep-fold 
might  have  furnished  them  a  screen  (or,  in  Westmoreland 
phrase,  a  hield)  against  the  weather  quarter  of  the  storm, 
in  which  hovel  they  might  be  lying  disabled  or  snowed 
up ;  and,  secondly,  as  regarded  themselves,  in  what  way 
they  were  to  make  known  their  situation,  in  case  the  snow 
should  continue  or  increase ;  for  starvation  stared  them  in 
the  face,  if  they  should  be  confined  for  many  days  to  their 
house. 

Meantime,  the  eldest  sister,  little  Agnes,  though  sadly 
alarmed,  and  feeling  the  sensation  of  eariness  as  twilight 
came  on,  and  she  looked  out  from  the  cottage  door  to  the 
dreadful  fells,  on  which,  too  probably,  her  parents  were 
lying  corpses,  (and  possibly  not  many  hundred  yards  from 
their  own  threshold,)  yet  exerted  herself  to  take  all  the 
measures  which  their  own  prospects  made  prudent.  And 
she  told  Miss  Wordsworth,  that,  in  the  midst  of  the 
oppression  on  her  little  spirit,  from  vague  ghostly  terrors, 
she  did  not  fail,  however,  to  draw  some  comfort  from  the 
consideration,  that  the  very  same  causes  which  produced 

email  concave  tract  of  ground,  shaped  like  the  bed  of  a  tarn.  Some 
causes  having  diverted  the  supphes  of  water,  at  some  remote  period, 
from  the  little  reservoir,  the  tarn  has  consequently  disappeared ;  but 
the  bed,  and  other  indications  of  a  tarn,  (particularly  a  little  ghyll, 
or  steep  rocky  cleft  for  discharging  the  water,)  having  remained  as 
memorials  that  it  once  existed,  the  country  people  have  called  it  the 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


their  danger  in  one  direction,  sheltered  them  from  danger 
of  another  kind  —  such  dangers  as  she  knew,  from  books 
that  she  had  read,  would  have  threatened  a  little  desolate 
flock  of  children  in  other  parts  of  England ;  that,  if  they 
could  not  get  out  into  Grasmere,  on  the  other  hand,  bad 
men,  and  wild  seafaring  foreigners,  who  sometimes  passed 
along  the  high  road  in  that  vale,  could  not  get  to  them ; 
and  that,  as  to  their  neighbors,  so  far  from  having  anything 
to  fear  in  that  quarter,  their  greatest  apprehension  was 
lest  they  might  not  be  able  to  acquaint  them  with  their 
situation ;  but  that,  if  that  could  be  accomplished,  the  very 
sternest  amongst  them  were  kind-hearted  people,  that 
would  contend  with  each  other  for  the  privilege  of  assist- 
ing them.  Somewhat  cheered  with  these  thoughts,  and 
having  caused  all  her  brothers  and  sisters  —  except  the 
two  little  things,  not  yet  of  a  fit  age  —  to  kneel  down  and 
say  the  prayers  which  they  had  been  taught,  this  admira- 
ble little  maiden  turned  herself  to  every  household  task 
that  could  have  proved  useful  to  them  in  a  long  captivity. 
First  of  all,  upon  some  recollection  that  the  clock  was 
nearly  going  down,  she  wound  it  up.  Next,  she  took  all 
the  milk  which  remained  from  what  her  mother  had  pro- 
vided for  the  children's  consumption  during  her  absence, 
and  for  the  breakfast  of  the  following  morning  —  this 
uckily  was  still  in  sufficient  plenty  for  two  day's  con- 
sumption, (skimmed  or  '  blue'  milk  being  only  one  half- 
penny a  quart,  and  the  quart  a  most  redundant  one,  in 
Grasmere)  —  this  she  took  and  scalded,  so  as  to  save  it 
from  turning  sour.  That  done,  she  next  examined  the 
meal  chest;  made  the  common  oatmeal  porridge  of  the 
lountry,  (the  burgoo  of  the  royal  navy ;)  but  put  all  of  the 
•;hildren,  except  the  two  youngest,  on  short  allowance; 
and,  by  way  of  reconciling  them  in  some  measure  to  this 
•tinted  meal,  she  found  out  a  little  hoard  of  flour,  part  of 


RECOLLECTIONS  OF  GBASMERE. 


443 


vsrhich  she  baked  for  them  upon  the  hearth  into  little 
cakes ;  and  this  unusual  delicacy  persuaded  them  to  think 
that  they  had  been  celebrating  a  feast.  Next,  before  night 
coming  on  should  make  it  too  trying  to  her  own  feelings, 
or  before  fresh  snow  coming  on  might  make  it  impossible, 
she  issued  out  of  doors.  There  her  first  task  was,  with 
the  assistance  of  two  younger  brothers,  to  carry  in  from 
the  peatstack  as  many  peats  as  might  serve  them  for  a 
week's  consumption.  That  done,  in  the  second  place,  she 
examined  the  potatoes,  buried  in  '  brackens,'  (that  is, 
withered  fern  :)  these  were  not  many  ;  and  she  thought  it 
better  to  leave  them  where  they  were,  excepting  as  many 
AS  would  make  a  single  meal,  under  a  fear  that  the  heat 
of  their  cottage  would  spoil  them,  if  removed. 

Having  thus  made  all  the  provision  in  her  power  for 
supporting  their  own  lives,  she  turned  her  attention  to  the 
cow.  Her  she  milked ;  but,  unfortunately,  the  milk  she 
gave,  either  from  being  badly  fed,  or  from  some  other 
cause,  was  too  trifling  to  be  of  much  consideration  towards 
the  wants  of  a  large  family.  Here,  however,  her  chief 
anxiety  was  to  get  down  the  hay  for  the  cow's  food  from 
a  loft  abov£  the  outhouse ;  and  in  this  she  succeeded  but 
imperfectly,  from  want  of  strength  and  size  to  cope  with 
the  difficulties  of  the  case ;  besides  that  the  increasing 
darkness  by  this  time,  together  with  the  gloom  of  the 
place,  made  it  a  matter  of  great  self-conquest  for  her  to 
worR  at  all ;  and,  as  respected  one  night  at  any  rate,  she 
placed  the  cow  in  a  situation  of  luxurious  warmth  and 
comfort.  Then  retreating  into  the  warm  house,  and 
'barring'  the  door,  she  sat  down  to  undress  the  two 
youngest  of  the  children ;  them  she  laid  carefully  and 
cosily  in  their  little  nests  up  stairs,  and  sang  them  to 
sleep.  The  rest  she  kept  up  to  bear  her  company  until 
the  clock  should  tell  them  it  was  midnight;  up  to  which 


444 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


time  she  had  still  a  lingering  hope  that  some  welcome 
shout  from  the  hills  above,  which  they  were  all  to  strain 
heir  ears  to  catch,  might  yet  assure  them  that  they  were 
not  wholly  orphans,  even  though  one  parent  should  have 
perished.  No  shout,  it  may  be  supposed,  was  ever  heard ; 
nor  could  a  shout,  in  any  case,  ha\e  been  heard,  for  the 
night  was  one  of  tumultuous  wind.  And  though,  amidst 
its  ravings,  sometimes  they  fancied  a  sound  of  voices, 
still,  in  the  dead  lulls  that  now  and  then  succeeded,  they 
heard  nothing  to  confirm  their  hopes.  As  last  services  to 
what  she  might  now  have  called  her  own  little  family, 
Agnes  took  precautions  against  the  drifting  of  the  snow 
within  the  door  and  the  imperfect  window,  which  had 
caused  them  some  discomfort  on  the  preceding  day ;  and, 
finally,  she  adopted  the  most  systematic  and  elaborate 
plans  for  preventing  the  possibility  of  their  fire  being 
extinguished,  which,  in  the  event  of  their  being  thrown 
upon  the  ultimate  resource  of  their  potatoes,  would  be 
absolutely  (and  in  any  event  nearly)  indispensable  to  their 
existence. 

The  night  slipped  away,  and  another  morning  came, 
bringing  with  it  no  better  hopes  of  any  kind.  Change 
there  had  been  none  but  for  the  worse.  The  snow  had 
greatly  increased  in  quantity ;  and  the  drifts  seemed  far 
more  formidable.  A  second  day  passed  like  the  first ; 
little  Agnes  still  keeping  her  little  flock  quiet,  and  tolera- 
bly comfortable ;  and  still  calling  on  all  the  elders  in 
succession,  to  say  their  prayers,  morning  and  night. 

A  third  day  came  ;  and  whether  it  was  on  that  or  on 
the  fourth,  I  do  not  now  recollect ;  but  on  one  or  other 
there  came  a  welcome  gleam  of  hope.  The  arrangement 
of  the  snow  drifts  had  shifted  during  the  night,  and 
though  the  wooden  bridge  was  still  impracticable,  a  low 
wall  had  been  exposed,  over  which,  by  a  very  considerable 


RECOLLECTIONS   OF  GRASMERE. 


445 


circuit,  and  crossing  the  low  shoulder  of  a  hill,  it  seemed 
possible  that  a  road  might  be  found  into  Grasmere.  In 
some  walls  it  was  necessary  to  force  gaps  ;  but  this  was 
effected  without  much  difficulty,  even  by  children ;  for 
the  Westmoreland  walls  are  always  '  open,'  that  is,  unce- 
mented  with  mortar  ;  and  the  push  of  a  stick  will  readily 
detach  so  much  from  the  upper  part  of  an  old  crazy  field 
wall,  as  to  lower  it  sufficiently  for  female  or  for  childish 
steps  to  pass.  The  little  boys  accompanied  their  sister 
until  she  came  to  the  other  side  of  the  hill,  which,  lying 
more  sheltered  from  the  weather,  and  to  windward,  offered 
a  path  onwards  comparatively  easy.  Here  they  parted  ; 
and  little  Agnes  pursued  her  solitary  mission  to  the  near- 
est house  she  could  find  accessible  in  Grasmere. 

No  house  could  have  proved  a  wrong  one  in  such  a 
case.  Miss  Wordsworth  and  I  often  heard  the  description 
renewed,  of  the  horror  which,  in  an  instant,  displaced  the 
smile  of  hospitable  greeting,  when  little  weeping  Agnes 
told  her  sad  tale.  No  tongue  can  express  the  fervid  sym- 
pathy which  travelled  through  the  vale,  like  the  fire  in  an 
American  forest,  when  it  was  learned  that  neither  George 
nor  Sarah  Green  had  been  seen  by  their  children  since  the 
day  of  the  Langdale  sale.  Within  half  an  hour,  or  little 
more,  from  the  remotest  parts  of  the  valley  —  some  of 
them  distant  nearly  two  miles  from  the  point  of  rendez- 
vous —  all  the  men  of  Grasmere  had  assembled  at  the 
little  cluster  of  cottages  called  '  Kirktown,'  from  their 
adjacency  to  the  venerable  parish  church  of  St.  Oswald. 
There  were  at  the  time  I  settled  in  Grasmere,  (viz.  in  the 
spring  of  1809,  and,  therefore,  I  suppose  at  this  time,  fif- 
teen months  previously,)  about  sixty-three  households  in 
the  vale  ;  and  the  total  number  of  souls  was  about  two 
uundred  and  sixty- five  ;  so  that  the  number  of  fighting  men 
irould  be  about  sixty  or  sixty-six,  according  to  the  com- 


HQ 


tilTERARY  REMINISCENCES 


mon  way  of  computing  the  proportion  ;  and  the  majority 
were  so  athletic  and  powerfully  built,  that,  at  the  village 
games  of  wrestling  and  leaping,  Professor  Wilson,  and 
some  visitors  of  his  and  mine,  scarcely  one  of  whom  was 
under  five  feet  eleven  in  height,  with  proportionable 
breadth,  seem  but  middle  sized  men  amongst  the  towering 
forms  of  the  Dalesmen.  Sixty  at  least,  after  a  short  con- 
sultation as  to  the  plan  of  operations,  and  for  arranging 
the  kind  of  signals  by  which  they  were  to  communicate 
from  great  distances,  and  in  the  perilous  events  of  mists, 
or  snow  storms,  set  off,  with  the  speed  of  Alpine  hunters, 
to  the  hills.  The  dangers  of  the  undertaking  were  con- 
siderable, under  the  uneasy  and  agitated  state  of  the 
weather  ;  and  all  the  women  of  the  vale  were  in  the  great- 
est anxiety,  until  night  brought  them  back,  in  a  body,  un- 
successful. Three  days  at  the  least,  and  I  rather  think  five, 
the  search  was  inefiectual  ;  which  arose  partly  from  the 
great  extent  of  the  ground  to  be  examined,  and  partly 
from  the  natural  mistake  made  of  ranging  almost  exclu- 
sively on  the  earlier  days  on  that  part  of  the  hills  over 
which  the  path  of  Easedale  might  be  presumed  to  have 
been  selected  under  any  reasonable  latitude  of  circuitous- 
ness.  But  the  fact  is,  when  the  fatal  accident  (for  such  it 
has  often  proved)  of  a  permanent  mist  surprises  a  man  on 
the  hills,  if  he  turns  and  loses  his  direction,  he  is  a  lost 
man  ;  and  without  doing  this  so  as  to  lose  the  power  of 
s'orienter  in  one  instant,  it  is  well  known  how  difiicult  it 
is  to  avoid  losing  it  insensibly  and  by  degrees.  Baffling 
snow  showers  are  the  worst  kind  of  mists.  And  the  poor 
Greens  had,  under  that  kind  of  confusion,  wandered  many 
a  mile  out  of  their  proper  track. 

The  zeal  of  the  people,  meantime,  was  not  in  the  least 
abated,  but  rather  quickened,  by  the  wearisome  disap- 
pointments; every  hour  of  daylight  was  turned  to  ac- 


HECOLLECTIONS  OF  GRASMERE. 


447 


count ;  no  man  of  the  valley  ever  came  home  to  dinner ; 
and  the  reply  of  a  young  shoemaker,  on  the  fourth  night's 
return,  speaks  sufficiently  for  the  unabated  spirit  of  the 
vale.  Miss  Wordsworth  asked  what  he  would  do  on  the 
next  morning,  '  Go  up  again,  of  course,'  was  his  answer. 
But  what  if  to-morrow  also  should  turn  out  like  all  the 
rest  ?  '  Why  go  up  in  stronger  force  on  the  next  day.' 
Yet  this  man  was  sacrificing  his  own  daily  earnings  with- 
out a  chance  of  recompense.  At  length  sagacious  dogs 
were  taken  up ;  and,  about  noonday,  a  shout  from  an 
aerial  height,  amongst  thick  volumes  of  cloudy  vapor, 
propagated  through  repeating  bands  of  men  from  a  dis- 
tance of  many  miles,  conveyed  as  by  telegraph  the  news 
that  the  bodies  were  found.  George  Green  was  found 
lying  at  the  bottom  of  a  precipice,  from  which  he  had 
fallen.  Sarah  Green  was  found  on  the  summit  of  the 
precipice  ;  and,  by  laying  together  all  the  indications  of 
what  had  passed,  the  sad  hieroglyphics  of  their  last 
agonies,  it  was  conjectured  that  the  husband  had  desired 
his  wife  to  pause  for  a  few  minutes,  wrapping  her,  mean- 
time, in  his  own  great  coat,  whilst  he  should  go  forward 
and  reconnoitre  the  ground,  in  order  to  catch  a  sight  of 
isome  object  (rocky  peak,  or  tarn,  or  peat-field)  which 
might  ascertain  their  real  situation.  Either  the  snow 
above,  already  lying  in  drifts,  or  the  blinding  snow  storms 
driving  into  his  eyes,  must  have  misled  him  as  to  the 
nature  of  the  circumjacent  ground ;  for  the  precipice  ovei 
v/hich  he  had  fallen  was  but  a  few  yards  from  the  spot  in 
which  he  had  quitted  his  wife.  The  depth  of  the  descent, 
\\d  the  fury  of  the  wind,  (almost  always  violent  on  these 
cloudy  altitudes,)  would  prevent  any  distinct  communica- 
tion between  the  dying  husband  below  and  his  despairing 
wife  above  ;  but  it  was  believed  by  the  shepherds,  best 
icquainted  with  the  ground  and  the  range  of  sound  as 


448 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


fegarded  the  capacities  of  the  human  ear,  under  the  pro- 
bable circumstances  of  the  storm,  that  Sarah  might  have 
caught,  at  intervals,  the  groans  of  her  unhappy  partner, 
supposing  that  his  death  were  at  all  a  lingering  one. 
Others,  on  the  contrary,  supposed  her  to  have  gathered 
this  catastrophe  rather  from  the  want  of  any  sounds,  and 
from  his  continued  absence,  than  from  any  one  distinct 
or  positive  expression  of  it ;  both  because  the  smooth  and 
unruffled  surface  of  the  snow  where  he  lay  seemed  to 
argue  that  he  had  died  without  a  struggle,  perhaps  without 
a  groan,  and  because  that  tremendous  sound  of  '  hurtling ' 
in  the  upper  chambers  of  the  air,  which  often  accompanies 
a  snow  storm,  when  combined  with  heavy  gales  of  wind, 
would  utterly  oppress  and  stifle  (as  they  conceived)  any 
sounds  so  feeble  as  those  from  a  dying  man.  In  any 
case,  and  by  whatever  sad  language  of  sounds  or  signs, 
positive  or  negative,  she  might  have  learned  or  guessed 
her  loss,  it  was  generally  agreed  that  the  wild  shrieks 
heard  towards  midnight  in  Langdale  *  Head  announced 
the  agonizing  moment  which  brought  to  her  now  widowed 
heart  the  conviction  of  utter  desolation  and  of  final  aban- 

*  I  once  heard,  also,  in  talking  with  a  Langdale  family  upon  this 
tragic  tale,  that  the  sounds  had  penetrated  into  the  valley  of  Little 
Langdale;  which  is  possible  enough.  For  although  this  interesting 
recess  of  the  entire  Langdale  basin  (which  bears  somewhat  of  the 
eame  relation  to  Great  Langdale  that  Easedale  bears  to  Grasmere) 
does,  in  fact,  lie  beyond  Langdale  Head  by  the  entire  breadth  of  that 
dale,  yet  from  the  singular  accident  of  having  its  area  raised  far 
above  the  level  of  the  adjacent  vales,  one  most  solitary  section  of 
Little  Langdale  (in  which  lies  a  tiny  lake,  and  on  the  banks  of  that 
lake  dwells  one  solitary  family)  being  exactly  at  right  angles  both  to 
Langdale  Head  and  to  the  other  complementary  section  of  the  Lesser 
Langdale,  i!3  brought  into  a  position  and  an  elevation  virtually 
much  nearer  to  objects  (especially  to  audible  objects)  on  the  Langdale 
Fells. 


RECOLLECTIONS  OF  ORASMEEE.  449 

donmeut  to  her  own  fast-fleeting  energies.  It  seemed 
probable  that  the  sudden  disappearance  of  her  husband 
from  her  pursuing  eyes  would  teach  her  to  understand  his 
fate  ;  and  that  the  consequent  indefinite  apprehension  of 
instant  death  lying  all  around  the  point  on  which  she  sat, 
had  kept  her  stationary  to  the  very  attitude  in  which  her 
husband  left  her,  until  her  failing  powers  and  the  increas- 
ing bitterness  of  the  cold,  to  one  no  longer  in  motion, 
would  soon  make  those  changes  of  place  impossible, 
which,  at  any  rate,  had  appeared  too  dangerous.  The 
footsteps  in  some  places,  wherever  drifting  had  not  obliter- 
ated them,  yet  traceable  as  to  the  outline,  though  partially 
filled  up  with  later  falls  of  snow,  satisfactorily  showed  that 
however  much  they  might  have  rambled,  after  crossing 
and  doubling  upon  their  own  paths,  and  many  a  mile 
astray  from  their  right  track,  still  they  must  have  kept 
together  to  the  very  plateau  or  shelf  of  rock  at  which  their 
wanderings  had  terminated ;  for  there  were  evidently  no 
steps  from  this  plateau  in  the  retrograde  order. 

By  the'  time  they  had  reached  this  final  stage  of  their 
erroneous  course,  all  possibility  of  escape  must  have  been 
long  over  for  both  alike  ;  because  their  exhaustion  must 
have  been  excessive  before  they  could  have  reached  a 
point  so  remote  and  high  ;  and,  unfortunately,  the  direct 
result  of  all  this  exhaustion  had  been  to  throw  them  farther 
ofi"  their  home,  or  from  '  any  dwelling-place  of  man,'  than 
they  were  at  starting.  Here,  therefore,  at  this  rocky  pin- 
nacle, hope  was  extinct  for  either  party.  But  it  was  the 
impression  of  the  vale,  that,  perhaps  within  half  an  hour 
before  reaching  this  fatal  point,  George  Green  might,  had 
tis  conscience  or  his  heart  allowed  him  in  so  bas;e  a  deser- 
tion, have  saved  himself  singly,  without  any  very  great 
difficulty.  It  is  to  be  hoped,  however  —  and,  for  my  part, 
'  think  too  well  of  human  nature  to  hesitate  in  believing 
29 


T.ITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


. —  that  not  many,  even  amongst  the  meaner-minded  and 
the  least  generous  of  men,  could  have  reconciled  them- 
selves to  the  abandonment  of  a  poor  fainting  female  com- 
panion in  such  circumstances.  Still,  though  not  more 
than  a  most  imperative  duty,  it  was  one  (I  repeat)  \vl  ich 
most  of  his  associates  believed  to  have  cost  him  (perhaps 
consciously)  his  life.  For  his  wife  not  only  must  have 
disabled  him  greatly  by  clinging  to  his  arm  for  support ; 
but  it  was  known,  from  her  peculiar  character  and  man- 
ner, that  she  would  be  likely  to  rob  him  of  his  coolness 
and  presence  of  mind  by  too  painfully  fixing  his  thoughts, 
where  her  own  would  be  busiest,  upon  their  helpless  little 
family.  ^  Stung  with  the  thoughts  of  home  '  —  to  borrow 
the  fine  expression  of  Thomson  in  describing  a  similar 
case  —  alternately  thinking  of  the  blessedness  of  that 
warm  fireside  at  Blentarn  Ghyll,  which  was  not  again 
to  spread  its  genial  glow  through  her  freezing  limbs,  and 
of  those  darling  little  faces  which,  in  this  world,  she  was 
to  see  no  more  ;  unintentionally,  and  without  being  aware 
even  of  that  result,  she  would  rob  the  brave  man  (for 
such  he  was)  of  his  fortitude,  and  the  strong  man  of  his 
animal  resources.  And  yet  —  (such,  in  the  very  opposite 
direction,  was  equally  the  impression  universally  through 
Grasmere)  —  had  Sarah  Green  foreseen,  could  her  afiec- 
tionate  heart  have  guessed  even  the  tenth  part  of  that  love 
and  neighborly  respect  for  herself,  which  soon  afterwards 
expressed  themselves  in  showers  of  bounty  to  her  children ; 
could  she  have  looked  behind  the  curtain  of  destiny  suffi- 
ciently to  learn  that  the  very  desolation  of  these  poor 
children  which  wrung  her  maternal  heart,  and  doubtless 
constituted  to  her  the  sting  of  death,  would  prove  the 
signal  and  the  pledge  of  such  anxious  guardianship  as  not 
many  rich  men's  children  receive,  and  that  this  overflow- 
ing offering  to  her  own  memory  would  not  be  a  hasty  or 


RECOLLECTIONS  OF  GRASMERE. 


451 


decaying  tribute  of  the  first  sorrowing  sensibilities,  but 
vvould  pursue  her  children  steadily  until  their  hopeful 
Bettlement  in  life  —  or  anything  approaching  this,  to  have 
known  or  have  guessed,  would  have  caused  her  (as  all 
said  who  knew  her)  to  welcome  the  bitter  end  by  which 
such  privileges  were  to  be  purchased. 

The  funeral  of  the  ill-fated  Greens  was,  it  may  be  sup- 
posed, attended  by  all  the  vale :  it  took  place  about  eight 
days  after  they  were  found  ;  and  the  day  happened  to  be  in 
the  most  perfect  contrast  to  the  sort  of  weather  which  pre- 
vailed at  the  time  of  their  misfortune  ;  some  snow  still 
remained  here  and  there  upon  the  ground  :  but  the  azure 
of  the  sky  was  unstained  by  a  cloud ;  and  a  golden  sun- 
light seemed  to  sleep,  so  balmy  and  tranquil  was  the 
season,  upon  the  very  hills  where  they  had  wandered  — 
then  a  howling  wilderness,  but  now  a  green  pastoral  lawn, 
in  its  lower  ranges,  and  a  glittering  expanse,  smooth,  ap- 
parently, and  not  difficult  to  the  footing,  of  virgin  snow,  in 
its  higher.  George  Green  had,  I  believe,  an  elder  family  by 
a  former  wife  ;  and  it  was  for  some  of  these  children,  who 
lived  at  a  distance,  and  who  wished  to  give  their  attend- 
ance at  the  grave,  that  the  funeral  was  delayed.  After 
this  solemn  ceremony  was  over  —  at  which,  by  the  way,  I 
then  heard  Miss  Wordsworth  say  that  the  grief  of  Sarah's 
illegitimate  daughter  was  the  most  overwhelming  she  had 
ever  witnessed  —  a  regular  distribution  of  the  children  was 
made  amongst  the  wealthier  families  of  the  vale.  There 
had  already,  and  before  the  funeral,  been  a  perfect  strug- 
gle to  obtain  one  of  the  children,  amongst  all  who  had  any 
facilities  for  discharging  the  duties  of  such  a  trust ;  and 
even  the  poorest  had  put  in  their  claim  to  bear  some  part 
in  the  expenses  of  the  case.  But  it  was  judiciously  de- 
rided, that  none  of  the  children  should  be  entrusted  to  any 
persons  who  seemed  likely,  either  from  old  age,  or  froio 


452 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


slender  means,  or  from  nearer  and  more  personal  respon- 
Bibilities,  to  be  under  the  necessity  of  devolving  the  trust, 
sooner  or  later,  upon  strangers,  who  might  have  none  of 
that  interest  in  the  children  which  attached,  in  their  minds^ 
the  Grasmere  people  to  the  circumstances  that  made  them 
orphans.  Two  twins,  who  had  naturally  played  together 
and  slept  together  from  their  birth,  passed  into  the  same 
family  :  the  others  were  dispersed  ;  but  into  such  kind- 
hearted  and  intelligent  families,  with  continued  opportuni- 
ties of  meeting  each  other  on  errands,  or  at  church,  or  at 
sales,  that  it  was  hard  to  say  which  had  the  happier  fate. 
And  thus  in  so  brief  a  period  as  one  fortnight,  a  house- 
hold that,  by  health  and  strength,  by  the  humility  of  pov- 
erty, and  by  innocence  of  life,  seemed  sheltered  from  all 
attacks  but  those  of  time,  came  to  be  utterly  broken  up. 
George  and  Sarah  Green  slept  in  Grasmere  churchyard, 
never  more  to  know  the  want  of  '  sun  or  guiding  star.' 
Their  children  were  scattered  over  wealthier  houses  than 
those  of  their  poor  parents,  through  the  vales  of  Grasmere 
or  Rydal  ;  and  Blentarn  Ghyll,  after  being  shut  up  for  a 
season,  and  ceasing  for  months  to  send  up  its  little  slender 
column  of  smoke  at  morning  and  evening,  finally  passed 
into  the  hands  of  a  stranger. 

The  Wordsworths,  meantime,  were  so  much  interested 
in  the  future  fortunes  and  the  suitable  education  of  the 
children  —  feeling,  no  doubt,  that,  when  both  parents,  in 
any  little  sequestered  community,  such  as  that  of  Gras- 
mere, are  suddenly  cut  off  by  a  tragical  death,  the  chil- 
dren, in  such  a  case,  become,  in  all  reason  and  natural 
humanity,  a  bequest  to  the  other  members  of  that  com- 
munity —  that  they  energetically  applied  themselves  to 
the  task  of  raising  funds  by  subscription  ;  most  of  which, 
•t  is  true,  might  not  be  wanted  until  future  years  should 
t>arry  one  after  another  of  the  children  successively  intc 


KECOLLECTIONS  OF  GRASMERB.  453 

different  trades  or  occupation ;  but  they  well  understood, 
that  more,  by  tenfold,  would  be  raised  under  an  imme- 
diate appeal  to  the  sympathies  of  men,  whilst  yet  burning 
fervently  towards  the  sufferers  in  this  calamity,  than  if 
the  application  were  delayed  until  the  money  should  be 
needed.  I  have  mentioned  that  the  Royal  Family  were 
made  acquainted  with  the  details  of  the  case  ;  that  they 
were  powerfully  affected  by  the  story,  especially  by  the 
account  of  little  Agnes,  and  her  premature  assumption  of 
the  maternal  character  ;  and  that  they  contributed  most 
munificently.  For  my  part,  I  could  have  obtained  a  good 
deal  from  the  careless  liberality  of  Oxonian  friends  tow- 
ards such  a  fund.  But  finding,  or  rather  knowing  pre- 
viously how  little,  in  such  an  application,  it  would  aid  me 
to  plead  the  name  of  Wordsworth  as  the  mover  of  the 
subscription,  (a  name  that  now  would  stand  good  for  some 
thousands  of  pounds  in  that  same  Oxford  —  so  passes  the 
injustice  as  well  as  the  glory  of  this  world!)  —  knowing 
this,  I  did  not  choose  to  trouble  anybody  ;  and  the  more 
so  as  Miss  Wordsworth,  upon  my  proposal  to  write  to 
various  ladies,  upon  whom  I  knew  that  I  could  rely  for 
their  several  contributions,  wrote  back  to  me,  desiring  that 
I  would  not ;  and  upon  this  satisfactory  reason  —  that  the 
fund  had  already  swelled  under  the  Royal  patronage,  and 
the  interest  excited  by  so  much  of  the  circumstances  as 
could  be  reported  in  hurried  letters,  to  an  amount  beyond 
what  was  likely  to  be  wanted  for  persons  whom  there  was 
no  good  reason  for  pushing  out  of  the  sphere  to  w^hich 
their  birth  had  called  them.  The  parish  even  was  liable 
to  give  aid  ;  and,  in  the  midst  of  Royal  bounty,  this  was 
not  declined.  Finally,  to  complete  their  own  large  share 
in  the  charity,  the  Words  worths  took  into  their  own  family 
one  of  the  children,  a  girl,  Sarah  by  name  ;  — the  least 
amiable,  I  beli-^ve,  of  the  whole  ;  so,  at  least,  I  imagined: 


454 


LITERACY  KEMINISCENCES. 


for  this  girl  it  was,  and  her  criminal  negligence,  that  in 
years  to  come  inflicted  the  first  heavy  wound  that  I  sus- 
tained in  my  affections,  and  first  caused  me  to  drink 
deeply  from  the  cup  of  grief. 

In  taking  leave  of  this  subject,  I  may  mention,  by  the 
way,  that  accidents  of  this  nature  are  not  by  any  means 
so  unaommon,  in  the  mountainous  districts  of  Cumberland 
and  Westmoreland,  as  the  reader  might  infer  from  the  in- 
tensity of  the  excitement  which  waited  on  the  catastrophe 
of  the  Greens.  In  that  instance,  it  was  not  the  simple 
death  by  cold  upon  the  hills,  but  the  surrounding  circum- 
stances, which  invested  the  case  with  its  agitating  power  : 
the  fellowship  in  death  of  a  wife  and  husband  ;  the  general 
impression  that  the  husband  had  perished  in  his  generous 
devotion  to  his  wife,  (a  duty  certainly,  and  no  more  than 
a  duty,  but  still,  under  the  instincts  of  self-preservation,  a 
generous  duty  ;)  sympathy  with  their  long  agony,  as  ex- 
pressed by  their  long  ramblings,  and  the  earnestness  of 
their  efforts  to  recover  their  home  ;  awe  for  the  long  con- 
cealment which  rested  upon  their  fate  ;  and  pity  for  the 
helpless  condition  of  the  children,  so  young,  and  so  instan- 
taneously made  desolate,  and  so  nearly  perishing  through 
the  loneliness  of  their  situation,  co-operating  with  stress  of 
weather,  had  they  not  been  saved  by  the  prudence  and 
timely  exertions  of  a  little  girl,  not  much  above  eight  years 
old  ;  —  these  were  the  circumstances  and  accessary  ad- 
juncts of  the  story  which  pointed  and  sharpened  the  public 
feelings  on  that  occasion.  Else  the  mere  general  case  of 
perishing  upon  the  mountains  is  not,  unfortunately,  so 
raxe,  in  any  season  of  the  year,  as,  for  itself  alone,  to  com- 
mand a  powerful  tribute  of  sorrow  from  the  public  mind. 
Natives  as  well  as  strangers,  shepherds  as  well  as  tourists, 
have  fallen  victims,  even  in  summer,  to  the  misleading 
and  confounding  effects  of  deep  mists.    Sometimes  they 


BECOLLECTIONS  OF  GBASMEKE. 


455 


have  continued  for  days  to  wander  unconsciously  in  a 
Bmall  circle  of  two  or  three  miles,  never  coming  within 
hail  of  a  human  dwelling,  until  exhaustion  has  forced  them 
into  a  sleep  which  has  proved  their  last.  Sometimes  a 
sprain  or  injury,  that  disabled  a  foot  or  a  leg,  has  destined 
them  to  die  by  the  shocking  death  of  hunger.^''  Sometimes 

*  The  case  of  Mr.  Gough,  who  perished  in  the  bosom  of  Helvellyn, 

and  was  supposed  by  some  to  have  been  disabled  by  a  sprain  of  the 
ankle,  whilst  others  believed  him  to  have  received  that  injury  and  hia 
death  simultaneously,  in  a  fall  from  the  lower  shelf  of  a  precipice, 
became  well  known  to  the  public,  in  all  its  details,  from  the  accident 
of  having  been  recorded  in  verse  by  two  writers  nearly  at  the  same 
time  —  by  Sir  Walter  Scott,  and  by  Wordsworth.  But  here,  again, 
as  in  the  case  of  the  Greens,  it  was  not  the  naked  fact  of  his  death 
amongst  the  solitudes  of  the  mountains  that  would  have  won  the 
public  attention,  or  have  obtained  the  honor  of  a  metrical  commemora- 
tion —  indeed,  to  say  the  truth,  the  general  sympathy  with  this  tragio 
event  was  not  derived  chiefly  from  the  unhappy  tourist's  melancholy 
end,  for  that  was  too  shocking  to  be  even  hinted  at  by  either  of  the 
two  writers,  (in  fact,  there  was  too  much  reason  to  fear  that  it  had 
been  the  lingering  death  of  famine)  —  not  the  personal  sufferings  of 
the  principal  figure  in  the  little  drama  —  but  the  sublime  and  myste- 
rious fidelity  of  the  secondary  figure,  his  dog;  this  it  was  which  won 
the  imperishable  remembrance  of  the  vales,  and  which  accounted  for 
the  profound  interest  that  immediately  gathered  round  the  incidents 
—  an  interest  that  still  continues  to  hallow  the  memory  of  the  dog. 
Not  the  dog  of  Athens,  nor  the  dog  of  Pompeii,  so  well  deserve  the 
immortality  of  history  or  verse.  Mr.  Gough  was  a  young  man, 
belonging  to  the  Society  of  *  Friends,*  who  took  an  interest  in  the 
nountain  scenery  of  the  lake  district,  both  as  a  lover  of  the  pic- 
turesque, and  as  a  man  of  science.  It  was  in  this  latter  character,  I 
believe,  that  he  had  ascended  Helvellyn  at  the  time  when  he  met 
his  melancholy  end.  From  his  local  fiimiliarity  with  the  ground  — 
for  he  had  been  an  annual  visitant  to  the  lakes  —  he  slighted  the 
usual  precaution  of  taking  a  guide;  and,  probably,  under  any  clear 
#tate  of  the  atmosphere,  he  might  have  found  the  attendance  of  such 
ft  person  a  superfluous  restraint  upon  the  freedom  of  his  motions, 
uid  of  his  solitary  thoughts.    Mist,  unfortunately  —  impenetrable 


156 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


ft  fall  from  the  summit  of  awful  precipices  has  dismissed 
them  from  the  anguish  of  perplexity  in  the  extreme,  from 

volumes  of  mist  —  came  floating  over  (as  so  often  they  do)  from  the 
gloomy  falls  that  compose  a  common  centre  for  Easedale,  Langdale, 
Eskdale,  Borrowdale,  W^stdale,  Gatesgarthdale,  (pronounced  Kes- 
kadale,)  and  Ennesdale.  Ton  or  fifteen  minutes  afford  ample  time 
for  this  aerial  navigation  .  within  that  short  interval,  sunlight,  moon- 
light, starlight,  alike  disappear;  all  paths  are  lost;  vast  precipices 
are  concealed,  or  filled  up  by  treacherous  draperies  of  vapor;  the 
points  of  the  compass  are  irrecoverably  confounded;  and  one  vast 
cloud,  too  often  the  cloud  of  death  even  to  the  experienced  shepherd, 
sits  like  a  vast  pavilion  upon  the  summits  and  the  gloomy  coves  of 
Helvellyn.  Mr.  Gough  ought  to  have  allowed  for  this  not  unfr« 
quent  accident ,  and  for  its  bewildering  effects,  under  which  all  local 
knowledge  (even  that  of  shepherds)  becomes  in  an  instant  unavail- 
ing. What  was  the  course  and  succession  of  his  dismal  adventures, 
after  he  became  hidden  from  the  world  by  the  vapory  screen,  could 
not  be  ever  deciphered  even  by  the  most  sagacious  of  mountaineers, 
although,  in  most  cases,  they  manifest  an  Indian  truth  of  eye, 
together  with  an  Indian  felicity  of  weaving  all  the  signs  that  the  eye 
can  gather  into  a  significant  tale,  by  connecting  links  of  judgment 
and  natural  inference,  especially  where  the  whole  case  ranges  within 
certain  known  limits  of  time  and  of  space;  but  in  this  case  two  acci- 
dents forbade  the  application  of  their  customary  skill  to  the  circum- 
stances. One  was,  the  want  of  snow  at  the  time,  to  receive  the 
impression  of  his  feet;  the  other,  the  unusual  length  of  time  through 
which  his  remains  lay  undiscovered  He  had  made  the  ascent  at  the 
latter  end  of  October — a  season  when  the  final  garment  of  snow, 
which  clothes  Helvellyn  from  the  setting  in  of  winter  to  the  sunny 
days  of  June,  has  frequently  not  made  its  appearance.  He  was  not 
discovered  until  the  following  spring,  when  a  shepherd,  traversing 
the  coves  of  Helvellyn  or  of  Fairfield  in  quest  of  a  stray  sheep,  was 
struck  by  the  unusual  sound  (and  its  echo  from  the  neighboring 
rocks)  of  a  short,  quick  bark,  or  cry  of  distress,  as  if  from  a  dog  or 
young  fox.  Mr.  Gough  had  not  been  missed  :  for  those  who  saw  or 
knew  of  his  ascent  from  the  Wyburn  side  of  the  mountain,  took  it  for 
granted  that  he  had  fulfilled  his  intention  of  descending  in  the  oj:  po- 
Bite  direction  into  the  valley  of  Patterdale,  or  into  the  Duke  of  Noi- 
folk's  deer-park  on  Ulleswater,  or  possibly  into^Matterdale;  and  tha 


EECOLLECTIONS  OF  GRASMEEE. 


457 


the  conflicts  of  hope  and  fear,  and  in  the  same  moment 
perhaps  from  life.  Sometimes,  also,  the  mountainous 
solitudes  have  been  made  the  scenes  of  remarkable  sui- 
cides :  in  particular,  there  was  a  case,  a  little  before  I 
came  into  the  country,  of  a  studious  and  meditative  young 
boy,  who  found  no  pleasure  but  in  books,  and  the  search 
after  knowledge.  He  languished,  with  a  sort  of  despairing 
nympholepsy,  after  intellectual  pleasures  —  for  which  he 
felt  too  well  assured  that  his  term  of  allotted  time,  the 
short  period  of  years  through  which  his  relatives  had  been 
willing  to  support  him  at  St.  Bees,  was  rapidly  drawing  to 
an  end.  In  fact,  it  was  just  at  hand  ;  and  he  was  sternly 
required  to  take  a  long  farewell  of  the  poets  and  geome- 
tricians for  whose  sublime  contemplations  he  hungered  and 
thirsted.  One  week  was  to  have  transferred  him  to  some 
huxtering  concern,  which  not  in  any  spirit  of  pride  he 
ever  affected  to  despise,  but  which  in  utter  alienation  of 
heart  he  loathed  —  as  one  whom  nature,  and  his  own 

he  had  finally  quitted  the  country  by  way  of  Penrith.  Having  no 
reason,  therefore,  to  expect  a  domestic  animal  in  a  region  so  far  from 
human  habitations,  the  shepherd  was  the  more  surprised  at  the 
Bound,  and  its  continued  iteration.  He  followed  its  guiding,  and 
came  to  a  deep  hollow,  near  the  awful  curtain  of  rock  called  Striding- 
Edge.  There,  at  the  foot  of  a  tremendous  precipice,  lay  the  body  of 
the  unfortunate  tourist;  and,  watching  by  his  side,  a  meagre  shadow, 
literally  reduced  to  a  skin  and  to  bones  that  could  be  counted,  (for  it 
is  a  matter  of  absolute  demonstration  that  he  never  could  have  ob- 
tained either  food  or  shelter  through  his  long  winter's  imprisonment,) 
Bate  this  most  faithful  of  servants  —  mounting  guard  upon  his  mas- 
ter's honored  body,  and  protecting  it  (as  he  had  done  effectually) 
from  all  violation  by  the  birds  of  prey  which  haunt  the  central  soli 
tudes  of  Helvellyn  :  — 

*  How  nourish 'd  through  that  length  of  time 
He  knows  —  Who  gave  that  love  sublime. 
And  sense  of  loyal  duty  —  greax 
Beyond  all  human  estimate.' 


458 


LITEEAKY  REMINISCENCES. 


diligent  cultivation  of  the  opportunities  recently  opeii  to 
him  for  a  brief  season,  had  dedicated  to  another  yoke.  He 
mused  —  revolved  his  situation  in  his  own  mind  —  com- 
puted his  power  to  liberate  himself  from  the  bondage  of 
dependency  —  calculated  the  chances  of  his  ever  obtaining 
this  liberation,  from  change  in  the  position  of  his  family, 
or  revolution  in  his  fortunes  —  and,  finally,  attempted  con- 
jecturally  to  determine  the  amount  of  effect  which  his  new 
and  illiberal  employments  might  have  upon  his  own  mind 
in  weaning  him  from  his  present  elevated  tasks,  and  unfit- 
ting him  for  their  enjoyment  in  distant  years,  when  cir- 
cumstances might  again  place  it  in  his  power  to  indulge 
them. 

These  meditations  were,  in  part,  communicated  to  a 
friend ;  and  in  part,  also,  the  result  to  which  they  brought 
him.  That  this  result  was  gloomy,  his  friend  knew  ;  but 
not,  as  in  the  end  it  appeared,  that  it  was  despairing. 
Such,  however,  it  was  :  and,  accordingly,  having  satisfied 
himself  that  the  chances  of  a  happier  destiny  were  for  him 
slight  or  none  —  and  having,  by  a  last  fruitless  effort, 
ascertained  that  there  was  no  hope  whatever  of  mollifying 
his  relatives,  or  of  obtaining  a  year's  delay  of  his  sentence 
—  he  walked  quietly  up  to  the  cloudy  wilderness  within 
Blencathara  ;  read  his  ^schylus,  (perhaps  in  those  appro- 
priate scenes  of  the  Prometheus,  that  pass  amidst  the  wild 
valleys  of  the  Caucasus,  and  below  the  awful  summits, 
untrod  by  man,  of  the  ancient  Elborus  ;)  read  him  for  the 
last  time  ;  for  the  last  time  fathomed  the  abyss-like  sub- 
til ties  of  his  favorite  geometrician,  the  mighty  Apollonius ; 
for  the  last  time  retraced  some  parts  of  the  narrative,  so 
simple  in  its  natural  grandeur,  composed  by  that  imperial 
captain,  the  most  majestic  man  of  ancient  ifistory  — 

'  The  fbremost  man  of  all  this  world,' 
in  the  confession  of  his  enemies  —  the  first  of  the  Caesars. 


RECOLLECTIONS  OF  GRASMERE. 


459 


These  three  authors  —  iEschylus,  Apollonius,  and  Caesai 
—  he  studied  until  the  daylight  waned,  and  the  stars  began 
to  appear.  Then  he  made  a  little  pile  of  the  three  vol- 
ames  that  served  him  for  a  pillow ;  took  a  dose,  such  as 
he  had  heard  would  be  sufficient,  of  laudanum  ;  laid  his 
head  upon  the  records  of  the  three  mighty  spirits  of  elder 
times ;  and,  with  his  face  upturned  to  the  heavens  and  the 
stars,  slipped  quietly  away  into  a  sleep  upon  which  nc 
morning  ever  dawned.  The  laudanum  —  whether  it  \vere 
from  the  effect  of  the  open  air,  or  from  some  peculiarity  of 
temperament  —  had  not  produced  sickness  in  the  first 
stage  of  its  action,  nor  convulsions  in  the  last.  But  from 
the  serenity  of  his  countenance,  and  from  the  tranquil 
maintenance  of  his  original  supine  position  —  for  his  head 
was  still  pillowed  upon  the  three  intellectual  Titans, 
Greek,  and  Roman,  and  his  eyes  were  still  directed 
towards  the  stars  —  it  would  appear  that  he  had  died 
placidly,  and  without  a  struggle.  In  this  way,  the  im- 
prudent boy,  who,  like  Chatterton,  would  not  wait  for  the 
change  that  a  da}  might  bring,  obtained  the  liberty  he 
sought  ;  and  whatsoever,  in  his  last  scene  of  life,  was  not 
explained  by  the  objects  and  the  arrangement  of  the 
objects  about  him,  found  a  sufficient  solution  in  previous 
conversations  with  various  acquaintances,  and  in  his  con- 
fidential explanations  of  his  purposes,  which  he  had  com- 
municated, so  far  as  he  felt  it  safe,  to  his  only  friend. ^ 

Reverting,  however,  from  this  little  episode  to  the  more 
ordinary  case  of  shepherds,  whose  duties,  in  searching 
after  missing  sheep,  or  after  sheep  surprised  by  sudden 
snow-drifts,  are  too  likely,  in  all  seasons  of  severity,  to 
bring  them  within  reach  of  dangers  which,  in  relation  to 
their  natural  causes,  must  probably  for  ever  remain  the 
same  ;  and  it  seems  the  more  surprising,  and  the  more  to 
be  deplored,  that  no  effort  has  been  made,  or  at  least  none 


• 


m 


LITERARY  REMINISCEJiCES, 


commensurate  to  tlie  evil  —  none  upon  a  scale  that  can 
be  called  national  —  to  apply  the  resources  of  art  and 
human  contrivance,  in  any  one  of  many  possible  modes,  to 
the  relief  of  a  case  which,  in  some  years,  has  gone  near 
to  the  depopulation  of  a  whole  pastoral  hamlet,  as  respects 
the  most  vigorous  and  hopeful  part  of  its  male  population ; 
and  which  annually  causes,  by  its  mere  contemplation,  the 
heartache  to  many  a  young  wife,  and  many  an  anxious 
mother.  In  reality,  amongst  all  pastoral  districts,  where 
the  field  of  their  labor  lies  in  mountainous  tracts,  an 
allowance  is  as  regularly  made  for  the  loss  of  human  life, 
in  severe  autumns  or  springs  —  by  accidents,  owing  to 
mists  or  storms  suddenly  enveloping  the  hills,  and  surpris- 
ing the  shepherds  —  as  for  the  loss  of  sheep  :  some  pro- 
portion out  of  each  class  is  considered  as  a  kind  of  tithe- 
offering  to  the  stern  goddoss  of  calamity,  and  in  the  light 
of  a  ransom  for  those  who  escape.  Grahame,  the  excel- 
lent author  of  the  '  Sabbath,'  says  that  (confining  himself 
to  Scotland)  he  has  known  winters  in  which  a  single  parish 
lost  as  many  as  ten  shepherds.  And  this  mention  of 
Grahame  reminds  me  of  a  most  useful  and  feasible  plan 
proposed  by  him  for  obviating  the  main  pressure  of  such 
situations,  amidst  snow  and  solitude,  and  night.  I  call  it 
feasible  with  good  reason  ;  for  Grahame,  who  doubtless 
has  made  the  calculations,  declares  that,  for  so  trifling  a 
sum  as  a  few  hundred  pounds,  every  square  mile  in  the 
Bouthern  counties  of  Scotland,  (that  is,  I  presume,  through- 
out the  Lowlands,)  might  be  fitted  up  with  his  apparatus ; 
and,  when  that  sum  is  compared  with  the  lavish  expendi- 
ture upon  lifeboats,  it  will  appear  trivial  indeed.  He  pre- 
faces hisi  plan  by  one  general  remark,  to  which  I  believe 
that  every  mountaineer  will  assent,  viz.  that  the  vast 
majority  of  deaths  in  such  cases  is  owing  to  the  waste  of 
tnimal  power  in  trying  to  recover  the  right  direction;  and 


HECOLLECTIONS  OF  GBASMEHE. 


461 


probably,  it  would  be  recovered  in  a  far  greater  numbei  of 
instances,  were  the  advance  persisted  in  according  to  any 
unity  of  plan  :  but  partly  the  distraction  of  mind  and  ir- 
resolution, under  such  circumstances,  cause  the  wanderer 
frequently  to  change  his  direction  voluntarily,  according 
to  any  new  fancy  that  starts  up  to  beguile  him ;  and  partly^ 
he  changes  it  often  insensibly  and  unconsciously,  from  the 
same  cause  which  originally  led  him  astray.  Obviously, 
therefore,  the  primary  object  should  be,  to  compensate  the 
loss  of  distinct  vision  —  which,  for  the  present,  is  irrepara- 
ble in  that  form  —  by  substituting  an  appeal  to  another 
sense.  That  error  which  has  been  caused  by  the  obstruc- 
tion of  the  eye,  may  be  corrected  by  the  sounder  informa- 
tion of  the  ear.  Let  cresses,  such  as  are  raised  for  other 
purposes  in  Catholic  lands,  be  planted  at  intervals,  sup- 
pose of  one  mile,  in  every  direction.  '  Snow  storms,'  says 
Grahame,  '  are  almost  always  accompanied  with  wind. 
Suppose,  then,  a  pole,  fifteen  feet  high,  well  fixed  in  the 
ground,  with  two  cross  spars  placed  near  the  bottom,  to 
denote  the  airts,  (or  points  of  the  compass;)  a  bell  hung 
at  the  top  of  this  pole,  with  a  piece  of  flat  wood  (attached 
to  it)  projecting  upwards,  would  ring  with  the  slightest 
breeze.  As  they  would  be  purposely  made  to  have  dif- 
ferent tones,  the  shepherd  would  soon  be  able  to  distin- 
guish one  from  another.  He  could  never  be  more  than  a 
mile  from  one  or  other  of  them.  On  coming  to  the  spot, 
he  would  at  once  know  the  points  of  the  compass,  and  of 
'ourse,  the  direction  in  which  his  home  lay.*  This  is  part 
vf  the  note  attached  to  the  '  Winter  Sabbath  Walk,'  and 
particularly  referring  to  the  following  picturesque  pas* 
sages  :  — 

*  Now  is  the  time 
To  visit  Nature  in  her  grand  attire ; 
Though  perilous  the  mountainous  ascent, 
A  noble  recompense  the  danger  brings. 


462  XITERARY  KEMINISCENCES. 

Howr  beautiful  the  plain  stretched  far  below  I 
Unvaried  though  it  be,  save  by  yon  stream 
With  azure  windings,  or  the  leafless  wood. 
But  what  the  beauty  of  the  plain  compar'd 
To  that  sublimity  which  reigns  enthron'd, 
Holding  joint  rule  with  solitude  divine, 
Among  yon  rocky  fells  that  bid  defiance 
To  steps  the  most  adventurously  bold  ? 
There  silence  dwells  profound ;  or,  if  the  cry 
Of  high-pois'd  eagle  break  at  times  the  calm. 
The  mantled  echoes  no  response  return. 

But  let  me  now  explore  the  deep-sunk  dell. 
No  foot-print,  save  the  covey's  or  the  flock's. 
Is  seen  along  the  rill,  where  marshy  springs 
Still  rear  the  grassy  blade  of  vivid  green. 
Beware,  ye  shepherds,  of  these  treacherous  haunts^ 
Nor  linger  there  too  long  :  the  wintry  day 
Soon  closes;  and  full  oft  a  heavier  fall. 
Heaped  by  the  blast,  fills  up  the  sheltered  glen, 
While,  gurgling  deep  below,  the  buried  rill 
Mines  for  itself  a  snow-covered  way.    0  then 
Your  helpless  charge  drive  from  the  tempting  spot; 
And  keep  them  on  the  bleak  hill's  stormy  side. 
Where  night-winds  sweep  the  gathering  drift  away.' 

A  more  useful  suggestion  was  never  made.  Many 
thousands  of  lives  would  be  saved  in  each  century  by  the 
general  fidoption  of  Mr.  Grahame's  plan ;  and  two  or  three 
further  hints  may  be  added.  1.  Before  these  crosses  can 
be  sown  as  plentifully  as  he  proposes,  it  will,  in  a  large 
majority  of  cases,  answer  the  same  end,  to  make  such  an 
approximation  to  his  plan  as  would  not  cost,  perhaps,  more 
than  one  quarter  of  the  first  expense,  viz.  by  placing  the 
crosses  at  such  distances  that  the  bell  might  make  itself 
Ueard:  suppose  the  intervals  to  be  four  miles,  then  the 
greatest  possible  distance  from  the  sound  would  be  two 
miles ;  and  so  far  a  bell  might  send  its  sound  upon  the 
oreeze,  for  there  will  be  always  some  of  these  crosses  to 


RECOLLECTIONS  OF  GRASMERE.  463 

mndward.  2.  They  might  be  made  of  cast-iron  —  as  one 
means  of  ensuring  their  preservation.  3.  There  might  be 
a  box,  or  little  cell  attached,  capable  of  receiving  one 
person :  this  should  be  suspended  at  a  height,  suppose  of 
eight  feet,  from  the  ground  ;  and  the  entrance  should  be 
by  a  little  ladder  leading  into  the  box  through  an  orifice 
from  below ;  which  orifice  should  be  covered  by  a  little 
door  or  lid  —  one  that  should  open  inwards  when  pressed 
by  the  head  of  the  ascending  person.  Finally,  in  a 
country  where  mile-stones  and  guide-posts  are  often 
wantonly  mutilated  or  destroyed,  it  may  be  thought  that 
these  crosses  would  not  long  be  in  a  condition  to  do  their 
office  ;  in  particular,  that  the  bells  would  be  detached  and 
carried  off.  But  it  should  be  remembered,  that  even  mile- 
stones on  the  most  public  roads  have  ceased  to  be  injured 
since  they  have  been  made  of  iron;  that  these  crosses 
never  would  be  in  a  populous  region,  but  exactly  in  the 
most  solitary  places  of  the  island ;  and  that  in  any  case 
where  they  ceased  to  be  solitary,  there  the  crosses  would 
cease  to  be  necessary. 

Another  protecting  circumstance  would  rise  out  of  the 
simplicity  of  manners,  which  is  pretty  sure  to  prevail  in  a 
mountainous  region,  and  the  pious  tenderness  universally 
felt  towards  those  situations  of  peril,  which  are  incident  to 
all  alike  —  men  and  women,  parents  and  children,  the 
strong  and  the  weak.  The  crosses,  I  would  answer  for  it, 
whenever  they  are  erected,  will  be  protected  by  a  super- 
stition such  as  that  which  in  Holland  consecrates  the  loss 
of  a  stork,  and  in  most  countries  of  some  animal  or  other. 
But  it  would  be  right  to  strengthen  this  feeling,  by  in- 
stilling it  as  a  principle  of  duty,  in  the  catechisms  of 
mountainous  regions :  and,  perhaps,  also,  to  invest  this 
vuty  with  a  religious  sanctity,  at  the  approach  of  every 
mnter  there  might  be  read  from  the  altar  a  solemn  com- 


464  LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 

miuation,  such  as  that  which  the  English  Church  appointff 
foi  Ash 'Wednesday  —  'Cursed  is  he  that  removeth  his 
neighbor's  landmark,'  &c.,  &c.,  to  which  might  now  be 
added  — '  Cursed  is  he  that  causeth  the  steps  of  the 
wayfarer  to  go  astray,  and  layeth  snares  for  the  belated 
traveller  in  the  wilderness ;  cursed  is  he  that  removeth 
the  bell  from  the  snow-cross.'  And  every  child  might 
learn  to  fear  a  judgment  of  retribution  upon  its  own  steps 
in  case  of  any  such  wicked  action,  by  reading  the  tale  of 
him,  who,  in  order 

*  To  plague  the  Abbot  of  Aberbrothock,' 

removed  the  bell  from  the  Inchcape  rock;  which  same 
rock,  in  after  days,  and  for  want  of  this  very  warning 
bell,  inflicted  miserable  ruin  upon  himself,  his  ship,  and 
his  unoffending  crew.  Warning  sentences  should  also  be 
inscribed  upon  all  the  four  faces  of  the  little  cell,  that 
nobody  might  ofi*end  in  a  spirit  of  jest  or  forgetfulness  ; 
and  as  the  century  advanced,  a  memorial  list,  (like  the 
Roman  votive  tablets,  suspended  on  the  walls  of  temples,) 
should  be  firmly  attached  to  the  cross,  of  all  who  had 
benefited  by  its  shelter.  The  mere  fact  of  having 
ascended  the  ladder,  being  taken  as  sufficient  evidence 
that  a  sanctuary  had  been  found  necessary.  The  sanctity 
of  the  place  might,  in  one  generation,  be  so  far  improved 
as  to  protect  a  small  supply  of  brandy  and  biscuit,  to  be 
lodged  there  on  the  coming  of  winter.  If  a  few  rockets, 
and  some  apparatus  for  lighting  a  match  were  also  left 
iccessible  in  some  of  the  remoter  solitudes,  the  storm- 
b*^und  ai  d  exhausted  wanderer  would,  besides  recruiting 
his  strength,  find  it  possible  to  telegraph  his  situation 
to  some  one  of  the  neighboring  valleys.  Once  made 
Bacred  from  violafion,  these  crosses  might  afterwards 
be  made  subjects  of  suitable  ornament;  that  is  to  say. 


RECOLLECTIONS  OF  GRASMERE. 


465 


they  might  be  made  as  picturesque  in  form,  and  color, 
and  material,  as  the  crosses  of  Alpine  countries,  or 
the  guide-posts  of  England  often  are.  The  associated 
circumstances  of  storm  and  solitude,  of  winter,  of  night, 
and  wayfaring,  would  give  dignity  to  almost  any  form 
which  had  become  familiar  to  the  eye  as  the  one  appro- 
priated to  this  purpose  ;  and  the  particular  form  of  a 
cross  or  crucifix,  besides  its  own  beauty,  would  suggest 
to  the  mind  a  pensive  allegoric  memorial  of  that  spiritual 
asylum,  offered  by  the  same  emblem  to  the  poor  erring 
roamer  in  our  human  pilgrimage,  whose  steps  are  beset 
with  other  snares,  and  whose  heart  is  made  anxious  by 
another  darkness,  and  another  storm  —  the  darkness  of 
guilt,  or  the  storm  of  affliction.  If  iron  was  found  too 
costly,  it  might  be  used  only  for  the  little  cell ;  and  the 
rest  of  the  structure  might  be  composed  with  no  expense 
at  all,  except  the  labor,  (and  that  would  generally  be  given 
by  public  contribution  of  the  neighborhood,)  from  the  rude 
undressed  stones  which  are  alwa)  s  found  lying  about  in 
such  situations,  and  which  are  so  sufficient  for  all  pur- 
poses of  strength,  that  the  field-walls,  and  by  far  the 
greater  number  of  the  dwelling-houses  in  Westmoreland, 
8 re  built  of  such  materials,  and,  until  late  years,  without 
mortar.*  But,  whatever  were  the  materials,  the  name  of 
these  rural  guides  and  asylums  —  'storm -crosses'  —  would 

*  This  recent  change  in  the  art  of  rustic  masonry  by  the  adoption 
cf  mortar,  does  not  mark  any  advance  in  that  art,  but,  on  the  con- 
trary, a  decay  of  skill  and  care.  Twenty  years  ago,  when  *  dry  ' 
walls  were  in  general  use  except  for  a  superior  class  of  houses,  it 
was  necessary  to  supply  the  want  of  mortar  by  a  much  nicer  adap- 
tation of  the  stones  to  each  other.  But  now  this  care  is  regarded  as 
quite  superfluous  ;  for  the  largest  gaps  and  cavities  amongst  the 
stones  are  filled  up  with  mortar  ;  meantime,  the  walls  built  in  this 
way  are  not  so  impervious  either  to  rain  or  wind  as  those  upon  the 
vld  patent  construction  of  the  past  generation. 
30 


i66 


LITERAKY  HEMINISCENCES. 


continually  remind  both  the  natives  and  strangers  of  their 
purpose  and  functions  —  functions  that,  in  the  process  of 
time,  would  make  them  as  interesting  to  the  imagination 
and  to  the  memory,  as  they  would,  in  fact,  be  useful  and 
hope-sustaining  to  the  shepherd  surprised  by  snow,  and 
the  traveller  surprised  by  night. 


THE  S4RA.CEn's  HEAB. 


467 


CHAPTER  XVI. 

THE  SARACEN'S  HEAD. 


My  first  visit  to  the  Wordsworths  had  been  made  in 
November,  1807;  but,  on  that  occasion,  from  the  neces- 
sity of  saving  the  Michaelmas  Term  at  Oxford,  for  which 
I  had  barely  left  myself  time,  I  stayed  only  one  week. 
On  the  last  day,  I  witnessed  a  scene,  the  first  and  the  last 
of  its  kind  that  ever  I  did  witness,  almost  too  trivial  to 
mention,  except  for  the  sake  of  showing  what  things  occur 
in  the  realities  of  experience,  which  a  novelist  could  not 
venture  to  imagine.  Wordsworth  and  his  sister  were 
under  an  engagement  of  some  standing  to  dine  on  that 
day  with  a  literary  lady  about  four  miles  distant ;  and,  as 
the  southern  mail,  which  I  was  to  catch  at  a  distance  of 
eighteen  miles,  would  not  pass  that  point  until  long  after 
midnight.  Miss  Wordsworth  proposed  that,  rather  than 
pass  my  time  at  an  inn,  I  should  join  the  dinner  party ;  a 
proposal  rather  more  suitable  to  her  own  fervent  and  hos- 
pitable temper,  than  to  the  habits  of  our  hostess,  who 
must  (from  what  I  came  to  know  of  her  in  after  years) 
have  looked  upon  me  as  an  intruder.  Something  had 
reached  Miss  Wordsworth  of  her  penurious  menage^  but 
mthing  that  approached  the  truth.  I  was  presented  to 
the  lady,  whom  we  found  a  perfect  has  bleu  of  a  verj 
eommonplace  order,  but  having  some  other  accomplish- 
TRcnta  beyond  her  slender  acquaintance  with  literature. 


468 


LITEUARY  REMINISCENCES. 


Our  party  consisted  of  six  —  our  hostess,  who  might  be 
about  fifty  years  of  age ;  a  pretty  timid  young  woman, 
who  was  there  in  the  character  of  a  humble  friend  ;  some 
stranger  or  other;  the  Wordsworths,  and  myself.  The 
dinner  was  the  very  humblest  and  simplest  I  had  ever 
seen  —  in  that  there  was  nothing  to  offend  —  I  did  not 
then  know  that  the  lady  was  very  rich  —  but  also  it  was 
flagrantly  insufficient  in  quantity.  Dinner,  however,  pro- 
ceeded ;  when,  without  any  removals,  in  came  a  kind  of 
second  course,  in  the  shape  of  a  solitary  pheasant.  This, 
in  a  cold  manner,  she  asked  me  to  try ;  but  we,  in  our 
humility,  declined  for  the  present ;  and  also  in  mere  good- 
nature, not  wishing  to  expose  too  palpably  the  insufficiency 
of  her  dinner.  May  I  die  the  death  of  a  traitor,  if  she 
did  not  proceed,  without  further  question  to  any  one  of  us, 
(and  as  to  the  poor  young  companion,  no  form  of  even 
invitation  was  conceded  to  her,)  and,  in  the  eyes  of  us  all, 
ate  up  the  whole  bird,  from  alpha  to  omega.  Upon  my 
honor,  I  thought  to  myself,  this  is  a  scene  I  would  not 
have  missed.  It  is  well  to  know  the  possibilities  of  human 
nature.  Could  she  have  a  bet  depending  on  the  issue, 
and  would  she  explain  all  to  us  as  soon  as  she  had  won 
her  wager  ?  Alas  !  no  explanation  ever  came,  except,  in- 
deed, that  afterwards  her  character,  put  en  evidence  upon 
a  score  of  occasions,  too  satisfactorily  explained  everything. 
No ;  it  was,  as  Mr.  Coleridge  expresses  it,  a  psychological 
curiosity  —  a  hollow  thing  —  and  only  once  matched  in 
all  the  course  of  my  reading,  in  or  out  of  romances  ;  but 
that  once,  I  grieve  to  say  it,  was  by  a  king,  and  a  sort  of 
hero. 

The  Duchess  of  Marlborough  it  is,  who  reports  the 
Bhocking  anecdote  of  William  III,,  that  actually  Princess 
Anne,  his  future  wife,  durst  not  take  any  of  the  green 
Deas  brought  to  the  dinner  table,  when  that  vegetable 


THE  Saracen's  head. 


469 


happened  to  be  as  yet  scarce  and  premature.  There  was 
a  gentleman  !  And  such  a  lady  bad  we  for  our  hostess. 
However,  we  all  observed  a  suitable  gravity  ;  but  after- 
wards, when  we  left  the  house,  the  remembrance  affected 
us  differently ;  Miss  Wordsworth  laughed  with  undissem- 
bled  glee  ;  but  Wordsworth  thought  it  too  grave  a  matter 
for  laughing  —  he  was  thoroughly  disgusted ;  and  said  re- 
peatedly, a  person  cannot  be  honest,  positively  not  honest, 
who  is  capable  of  such  an  act.  The  lady  is  dead,  and  1 
shall  not  mention  her  name  :  she  lived  only  to  gratify  her 
selfish  propensities;  and  two  little  anecdotes  may  show 
the  outrageous  character  of  her  meanness.  I  was  now  on 
the  debtor  side  of  her  dinner  account,  and,  therefore,  in  a 
future  year  she  readily  accepted  an  invitation  to  come  and 
dine  with  me  at  my  cottage.  But,  on  a  subsequent  occa- 
sion, when  I  was  to  have  a  few  literary  people  at  dinner, 
whom  I  knew  that  she  greatly  wished  to  meet,  she  posi- 
tively replied  thus :  — '  No  ;  I  have  already  come  with  my 
young  lady  to  dine  with  you ;  that  puts  me  on  the  wrong 
side  by  one ;  now  if  I  were  to  come  again,  as  I  cannot 

leave  Miss  behind,  I  shall  then  be  on  the  wrong  side 

by  three  ;  and  that  is  more  than  I  could  find  opportunities 
to  repay  before  I  go  up  to  London  for  the  winter.'  'Very 
well,'  I  said,  '  give  me  35.  and  that  will  settle  the  account.' 
She  laughed,  but  positively  persisted  in  not  coming  until 
after  dinner,  notwithstanding  she  had  to  drive  a  distance 
of  ten  miles. 

The  other  anecdote  is  worse.  She  was  exceedingly 
careful  of  her  health;  and  not  thinking  it  healthy  to  drive 
about  in  a  close  carriage,  which,  besides,  could  not  have 
B-'ited  the  narrow  mountain  tracks,  to  which  her  sketching 
habits  attracted  her,  she  shut  up  ner  town  carriage  for  the 
Vummer,  and  jobbed  some  little  open  car.  Being  a  very 
Arge  woman,  and,  moreover,  a  masculine  woman,  with 


m 


LITEKARY  REMINISCENCES. 


a  bronzed  complexion,  and  always  choosing  to  wear,  at 
night,  a  turban,  round  hair  that  was  as  black  as  that  of  the 
'  Moors  of  Mslabar,'  she  presented  an  exact  likeness  of 
a  Saracen's  Head,  as  painted  over  inn-doors ;  whilst  the 
timid  and  delicate  young  lady  by  her  side,  looked  like 
'  dejected  Pity '  at  the  side  of  '  Revenge,'  when  as- 
suming the  war-denouncing  trumpet.  Some  Oxonians 
and  Cantabs,  who,  at  different  times,  were  in  the  habit 
of  meeting  this  oddly  assorted  party  in  all  nooks  of 
the  country,  used  to  move  the  question,  whether  the 
poor  horse  or  the  young  lady  had  the  worst  of  it? 
At  length  the  matter  was  decided :  the  horse  was  fast 
going  off  this  sublunary  stage ;  and  the  Saracen's  Head 
was  told  as  much,  and  with  this  little  addition  ;  —  that 
his  death  was  owing  inter  alia  to  starvation.  Her  answer 
was  remarkable  :  — '  But,  my  dear  madam,  that  is  his 
master's  fault ;  I  pay  so  much  a- day  —  he  is  to  keep  the 
horse.'  That  might  be,  but  still  the  horse  was  dying  — 
and  dying  in  the  way  stated.  The  Saracen's  Head  per- 
sisted in  using  him  under  those  circumstances  —  such  was 
her  '  bond '  —  and  in  a  short  time  the  horse  actually 
died.  Yes,  the  horse  died  —  and  died  of  starvation  —  or 
at  least  of  an  illness  caused  originally  by  starvation :  for 
so  said,  not  merely  the  whole  population  of  the  little 
neighboring  town,  but  also  the  surgeon.  Not  long  after, 
however,  the  lady,  the  Saracen's  Head,  died  herself;  but 
I  fear  not  of  starvation ;  for,  though  something  like  it 
did  prevail  at  her  table,  she  prudently  reserved  it  all  for 
her  guests  ;  in  fact,  I  never  heard  of  such  vigilant  care, 
and  so  much  laudable  exertion,  applied  to  the  promotion  of 
health  :  yet  all  failed,  and,  in  a  degree  which  confounded 
people's  speculations  upon  the  subject —  for  she  did  not 
live  much  beyond  sixty  ;  whereas  everybody  supposed 
chat  the  management  of  her  physical  system  entitled  he? 


THE  Saracen's  head. 


471 


to  outwaar  a  century.  Perhaps  the  prayers  of  horses 
might  avail  to  order  it  otherwise. 

But  the  singular  thing  about  this  lady's  mixed  and  con- 
tradictory character,  was,  that  in  London  and  Bath,  where 
her  peculiar  habits  of  life  were  naturally  less  accurately 
known,  she  maintained  the  reputation  of  one  who  united 
the  accomplishments  of  literature  and  art  with  a  remarka- 
ble depth  of  sensibility,  and  a  most  amiable  readiness  to 
enter  into  the  distresses  of  her  friends,  by  sympathy  the 
most  cordial,  and  consolation  the  most  delicate.  More 
than  once  I  have  seen  her  name  recorded  in  printed  books, 
and  attended  with  praises  that  tended  to  this  effect.  I 
have  seen  letters  also,  from  a  lady  in  deep  affliction  which 
spoke  of  the  Saracen's  Head  as  having  paid  her  the  first 
visit  from  which  she  drew  any  effectual  consolation.  Such 
are  the  erroneous  impressions  conveyed  by  biographical 
memoirs ;  or,  which  is  a  more  charitable  construction  of 
the  case,  such  are  the  inconsistencies  of  the  human  heart ! 
And  certainly  there  was  one  fact,  even  in  her  Westmore- 
land life,  that  did  lend  some  countenance  to  the  southern 
picture  of  her  amiableness  :  and  this  lay  in  the  cheerful- 
ness with  which  she  gave  up  her  time  {time,  but  not  much 
of  her  redundant  money)  to  the  promotion  of  the  charita- 
ble schemes  set  on  foot  by  the  neighboring  ladies  ;  some- 
times for  the  education  of  poor  children,  sometimes  for 
the  visiting  of  the  sick,  &c.,  &;c.  I  have  heard  several  of 
those  ladies  express  their  gratitude  for  her  exertions,  and 
declare  that  she  was  about  their  best  member.  But  their 
horror  was  undisguised  when  the  weekly  committee  came, 
by  rotation,  to  hold  its  sittings  at  her  little  villa ;  for,  as 
the  business  occupied  them  frequently  from  eleven  o'clock 
in  the  forenoon  to  a  late  dinner  hour,  and  as  many  of  them 
l^ad  a  fifteen  or  twenty  miles'  drive,  they  needed  some 
Refreshments :  but  these  were,  of  course,  a  '  great  idea ' 


472 


LITERAKY  KEMINISCENCES. 


at  the  Saracen's  Head  ;  since,  according  to  the  opigram 
which  ilhistrates  the  maxim  of  Tacitus,  that  omne  ignotum 
pro  magnifico,  and,  applying  it  to  the  case  of  a  miser's 
horse,  terminates  by  saying,  'What  vast  ideas  must  he 
have  of  oats  1 '  —  upon  the  same  principle  these  poor 
ladies,  on  these  fatal  committee  days,  never  failed  to  form 
most  exaggerated  ideas  of  bread,  butter,  and  wine.  And 
at  length,  some,  more  intrepid  than  the  rest,  began  to 
carry  biscuits  in  their  muffs,  and,  with  the  conscious 
tremors  of  school  girls,  (profiting  by  the  absence  of  the 
mistress  but  momentarily  expecting  detection,)  they  em- 
ployed some  casual  absence  of  their  unhostly  hostess  iii 
distributing  and  eating  their  hidden  '  viaticum.'  How- 
ever it  must  be  acknowledged,  that  time  and  exertion,  and 
the  sacrifice  of  more  selfish  pleasure  during  the  penance 
at  the  school,  were,  after  all,  real  indications  of  kindness 
to  her  fellow-creatures  ;  and,  as  I  wish  to  part  in  peace, 
even  with  the  Saracen's  Head,  I  have  reserved  this  anec- 
dote to  the  last :  for  it  is  painful  to  have  lived  on  terms  of 
good  nature,  and  exchanging  civilities,  with  any  human 
being,  of  whom  one  can  report  absolutely  no  good  thing  ; 
and  I  sympathize  heartily  with  that  indulgent  person  of 
whom  it  is  somewhere  recorded,  that  upon  an  occasion 
when  the  death  of  a  man  happened  to  be  mentioned,  who 
was  unanimously  pronounced  a  wretch  without  one  good 
quality,  '  monstrum  nulla  virtute  rederrvptum^  he  ventured, 
however,  at  last,  in  a  deprecatory  tone  to  say  —  '  Well,  he 
did  whistle  beautifully,  at  any  rate,' 

Talking  of '  whistling,'  reminds  me  to  return  from  my 
digression  ;  for  on  that  night,  the  12th  of  November, 
1807,  and  the  last  of  my  visits  to  the  Wordsworths,  I  took 
leave  of  them  in  the  inn  at  Ambleside,  about  ten  at  night ; 
and  the  post-chaise  in  which  I  crossed  the  country  to  catch 
the  mail,  was  driven  by  a  postilion  who  whistled  sc 


THE  SARACFN's  HEAD. 


delightfully,  that,  for  the  first  time  in  my  life,  I  *  ccame 
aware  of  the  prodigious  powers  which  are  lodged  poten- 
tially in  so  despised  a  function  of  the  vocal  organs.  Foi 
the  whole  of  the  long  ascent  up  Orrest  Head,  which 
oWiged  him  to  walk  his  horses  for  a  full  half-mile,  he 
made  the  woods  of  Windermere  ring  with  the  canorous 
sweetness  of  his  half  flute,  half  clarionet  music ;  but,  in 
fact,  the  subtle  melody  of  the  effect  placed  it  in  power  far 
beyond  either  flute  or  clarionet.  A  year  or  two  after- 
wards, I  heard  a  fellow- servant  of  this  same  postilion's, 
a  black,  play  with  equal  superiority  of  effect  upon  the 
jew's  harp ;  making  that,  which  in  most  hands  is  a  mere 
monotonous  jarring,  a  dull  reverberating  vibration,  into  a 
delightful  lyre  of  no  inconsiderable  compass.  We  have 
since  heard  of,  some  of  us  have  heard,  the  chinchopper. 
Within  the  last  hundred  years,  we  have  had  the  iEolian 
harp,  (first  mentioned  and  described  in  the  '  Castle  of 
Indolence,'  which  I  think  was  first  published  entire  about 
1738;)  then  the  musical  glasses;  then  the  celestina,  to 
represent  the  music  of  the  spheres,  introduced  by  Mr. 
Walker,  or  some  other  lecturing  astronomer  ;  and  many 
another  fine  effect  obtained  from  trivial  means.  But,  at 
this  moment,  I  recollect  a  performance  perhaps  more 
astonishing  than  any  of  them ;  a  Mr.  Worgman,  who  had 
very  good  introductions,  and  very  general  ones,  (for  he 
was  to  be  met  within  a  few  months  in  every  part  of  the 
island,)  used  to  accompany  himself  on  the  piano,  weaving 
extempore  long  tissues  of  impassioned  music,  that  were 
called  his  own,  but  which,  in  fact,  were  all  the  better  for 
not  being  such,  or  at  least  for  continually  embodying 
passages  from  Handel  and  Pergolesi.  To  this  substratum 
of  the  instrumental  music,  he  contrived  to  adapt  some 
anaccountable  and  indescribable  choral  accompaniment,  a 
pomp  of  sound,  a  tempestuous  blare  of  harmony  ascending 


474 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


in  clouds  not  from  any  one,  but  apparently  from  a  band 
of  Mr.  Worgman's ;  for  sometimes  it  was  a  trumpet, 
sometimes  a  kettle-drum,  sometimes  a  cymbal,  sometimes 
a  bassoon,  and  sometimes  it  was  all  of  these  at  once. 

*  And  now  'twas  like  all  instruments; 
And  now  it  was  a  flute ; 
And  now  it  was  an  angel's  voice, 
That  maketh  the  heavens  be  mute.' 

In  this  case,  I  presume,  that  ventriloquism  must  have  had 
something  to  do  with  the  effect ;  but  whatever  it  were,  the 
power  varied  greatly  with  the  state  of  his  spirits,  or  with 
some  other  fluctuating  causes  in  the  animal  economy. 
However,  the  result  of  all  these  experiences  is,  that  I  shall 
never  more  be  surprised  at  any  musical  effects,  the  very 
greatest,  drawn  from  whatever  inconsiderable  or  appa- 
rently inadequate  means  ;  not  even  if  the  butcher's  instru- 
ment, the  marrow-bones  and  cleaver,  or  any  of  those 
culinary  instruments  so  pleasantly  treated  by  Addison  in 
the  '  Spectator,'  such  as  the  kitchen  dresser  and  thumb, 
the  tongs  and  shovel,  the  pepper  and  salt-box,  should  be 
exalted,  by  some  immortal  butcher  or  inspired  scullion, 
into  a  sublime  harp,  dulcimer,  or  lute,  capable  of  wooing 
St.  Cecilia  to  listen,  able  even 

*  To  raise  a  mortal  to  the  skies, 
Or  draw  an  angel  down.* 

That  night,  as  I  was  passing  under  the  grounds  of 
Elleray,  then  belonging  to  a  Westmoreland  '  statesman,' 
a  thought  struck  me,  that  I  was  now  traversing  a  road 
with  which,  as  yet,  I  was  scarcely  at  all  acquainted,  but 
which,  in  years  to  come,  might  perhaps  be  as  familiar  to 
my  eye  (is  the  rooms  of  my  own  house  ;  and  possibly  that 
I  might  traverse  them  in  company  with  faces  as  yet  not 
tven  seen  by  me,  but  in  those  future  years  dearer  thar 


THE  SA^RACEN's  HEAD. 


475 


any  which  I  had  yet  known,  In  this  prophetic  glimpse 
there  was  nothing  very  marvellous  ;  for  what  could  he 
more  natural  than  that  I  should  come  to  reside  in  the 
neighborhood  of  the  Wordsworths,  and  that  this  might 
lead  to  my  forming  connections  in  a  country  which  I 
should  consequently  come  to  know  so  well  ?  I  did  not, 
however,  anticipate  so  definitely  and  circumstantially  as 
all  this  ;  but  generally  I  had  a  dim  presentiment  that  here, 
on  this  very  road,  I  should  often  pass,  and  in  company 
that  now,  not  even  conjecturally  delineated  or  drawn  out 
of  the  utter  darkness  in  which  they  were  as  yet  reposing, 
would  hereafter  plant  memories  in  my  heart,  the  last  that 
will  fade  from  it  in  the  hour  of  death.  Here,  afterwards, 
at  this  very  spot,  or  a  little  above  it,  but  on  this  very 
estate,  which  form  local  peculiarities  of  ground,  and  of 
sudden  angles,  was  peculiarly  kenspeck,  i,  e.  easy  of  re- 
cognition, and  could  have  been  challenged  and  identified 
at  any  distance  of  years  ;  here  afterwards  lived  Professor 
Wilson,  the  only  very  intimate  male  friend  I  have  had  ; 
nere,  too,  it  was,  my  M.,  that,  in  long  years  afterwards, 
through  many  a  score  of  nights  —  nights  often  dark  as 
Erebus,  and  amidst  thunders  and  lightnings  the  most  sub- 
lime —  we  descended  at  twelve,  one,  and  two  o'clock  at 
night,  speeding  from  Kendal  to  our  distant  home,  twenty 
miles  away.  Thou  wert  at  present  a  child  not  nine  years 
old,  nor  had  I  seen  thy  face,  nor  heard  thy  name.  But 
within  nine  years  from  that  same  night,  thou  wert  seated 
by  my  side  ;  —  and,  thenceforwards,  through  a  period  of 
fourteen  years,  how  often  did  we  two  descend,  hand 
locked  in  hand,  and  thinking  of  things  to  come,  at  a  pace 
of  hurricane ;  whilst  all  the  slee]?ing  woods  about  us 
re-echoed  the  uproar  cf  trampling  hoofs  and  groaning 
wheels.  Duly  as  we  mounted  the  crest  of  Orrest  Head, 
mechanically  and  of  themselves  almost,  and  spontaneously, 


476 


TilTERAUT  REMINISCENCES. 


without  need  of  voice  or  spur,  according  to  Westmoreland 
usage,  the  horses  flew  off  into  a  gallop,  like  the  pace  of  a 
swallow.^'  It  was  a  railroad  pace  that  we  ever  maintained  ; 
objects  were  descried  far  ahead  in  one  moment,  and  in 
the  next  were  crowding  into  the  rear.  Three  miles  and  a 
half  did  this  storm  flight  continue,  for  so  long  the  descent 
lasted.  Then,  for  many  a  mile,  over  undulating  ground, 
did  we  ultimately  creep  and  fly,  until  again  a  long  preeip- 
itous  movement,  again  a  storm  gallop,  that  hardly  suffered 
the  feet  to  touch  the  ground,  gave  warning  that  we  drew 
near  to  that  beloved  cottage  ;  warning  to  us  —  warning  to 
them  — 

 *  the  silence  that  is  here 

Is  of  the  grave,  and  of  austere 
But  happy  feelings  of  the  dead.' 

Sometimes  the  nights  were  bright  with  cloudless  moon- 
light, and  of  that  awful  breathless  quiet  which  often  broods 
over  vales  that  are  peculiarly  landlocked,  and  which  is, 
or  seems  to  be,  so  much  more  expressive  of  a  solemn 
hush  and  a  Sabbath-like  rest  from  the  labors  of  nature, 
than  I  remember  to  have  experienced  in  flat  countries  :  — 

*  It  is  not  quiet  —  is  not  peace  — 
But  something  deeper  far  than  these.' 

And  on  such  nights  it  was  no  sentimental  refinement,  but 

*  It  may  be  supposed,  not  literally,  for  the  swallow,  (or  at  least 
that  species  called  the  swift,)  has  been  known  to  fly  at  the  rate  of 
800  miles  an  hour.  Very  probably,  however,  this  pace  was  not  de- 
duced from  an  entire  hour's  performance,  but  estimated  by  proportion 
from  a  flight  of  one  or  two  minutes.  An  interesting  anecdote  is  told 
by  the  gentleman  (I  believe  the  Rev  E.  Stanley)  who  described  in 
Blackwood^ s  Magazine  the  opening  of  the  earliest  English  railway 
viz.  that  a  bird  (snipe  was  it,  or  field-fare,  or  plover.?)  ran,  or 
rather  flew,  a  race  with  the  engine  for  three  or  four  miles,  until  find- 
ing itself  likely  to  be  beaten,  it  then  suddenly  wheeled  away  into  th« 
moors. 


THE  SABACEN's  HEAD. 


477 


a  bincere  and  hearty  feeling,  that,  in  wheeling  past  the 
village  churchyard  of  Stavely,  something  like  an  outrage 
seemevl  offered  to  the  sanctity  of  its  graves,  by  the  uproar 
of  our  career.  Sometimes  the  nights  were  of  that  pitchy 
darkness  which  is  more  palpable  and  unfathomable  wher- 
ever hills  intercept  the  gleaming  of  light  which  other- 
wise is  usually  seen  to  linger  about  the  horizon  in  the 
northern  quarter ;  and  then  arose  in  perfection  that  strik- 
ing effect,  when  the  glare  of  lamps  searches  for  one 
moment  every  dark  recess  of  the  thickets,  forces  them 
into  sudden,  almost  daylight  revelation,  only  to  leave  them 
within  the  twinkling  of  the  eye  in  darkness  more  pro- 
found ;  making  them,  like  the  snow-flakes  falling  upon  a 
cataract,  '  one  moment  bright,  then  gone  for  ever.'  But, 
dark  or  moonlight  alike,  in  every  instance  throughout  so 
long  a  course  of  years,  the  road  was  entirely  our  own  for 
the  whole  twenty  miles.  After  nine  o'clock,  not  many 
people  are  abroad  ;  after  ten,  absolutely  none,  upon  the 
roads  of  Westmoreland  ;  a  circumstance  which  gives  a 
peculiar  solemnity  to  a  traveller's  route  amongst  these 
quiet  valleys  upon  a  summer  evening  of  latter  May,  of 
June,  or  early  July  ;  since,  in  a  latituda  so  much  higher 
than  that  of  London,  broad  daylight  prevails  to  an  hour 
long  after  nine.  Nowhere  is  the  holiness  of  vesper  hours 
more  deeply  felt.  And  now,  in  1839,  from  all  these  fly- 
ing journeys  and  their  stinging  remembrances,  hardly  a 
wreck  survives  of  what  composed  their  living  equipage  : 
the  men  who  chiefly  drove  in  those  days  (for  i  have  ascer- 
tained it)  are  gone  ;  the  horses  are  gone  ;  darkness  rests 
upon  all,  except  myself.  I,  wo  is  me  !  am  the  solitary 
Burvivor  from  scenes  that  now  seem  to  me  as  fugitive  as 
che  flying  lights  from  our  lamps  as  they  shot  into  the  forest 
recesses.  God  forbid  that  on  such  a  theme  I  should  seem 
to  affect  sentimentalism.    It  is  from  overmastering  recol- 


478 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


lections  tliat  I  look  back  on  those  distant  days  ;  and  chiefly 
I  have  suffered  myself  to  give  way  befor/'  the  impulse 
that  haunts  me,  of  reverting  to  those  bitter,  bitter  thoughts, 
in  order  to  notice  one  singular  waywardness  or  caprice 
(as  it  might  seem)  incident  to  the  situation,  which,  I  doubt 
not,  besieges  many  more  people  than  myself:  .it  is,  that  I 
find  a  more  poignant  suffering,  a  pang  more  searching,  in 
going  back,  not  to  those  enjoyments  themselves,  and  the 
days  when  they  were  within  my  power,  but  to  times  an- 
terior, when  as  yet  they  did  not  exist ;  nay,  when  some 
who  were  chiefly  concerned  in  them  as  parties,  had  not 
even  been  born.  No  night,  I  might  almost  say,  of  my 
whole  life,  remains  so  profoundly,  painfully,  and  patheti- 
cally imprinted  on  my  remembrance,  as  this  very  one, 
on  which  I  tried  prelusively,  as  it  were,  that  same  road 
m  solitude,  and  lulled  by  the  sweet  caroUings  of  the  pos- 
tilion, which,  after  an  interval  of  ten  years,  and  through 
a  period  of  more  than  equal  duration,  it  was  destined  that 
I  should  so  often  traverse  in  circumstances  of  happiness 
too  radiant,  that  for  me  are  burned  out  forever.  Coler- 
idge told  me  of  a  similar  case  that  had  fallen  within  his 
knowledge,  and  the  impassioned  expression  which  the 
feelings  belonging  to  it  drew  from  a  servant  woman  at 
Keswick  :  —  She  had  nursed  some  boy,  either  of  his  or  of 
Mr.  Southey's  ;  the  boy  had  lived  apart  from  the  rest  of 
the  family,  secluded  with  his  nurse  in  her  cottage  ;  she 
was  doatingly  fond  of  him  ;  lived,  in  short,  ly  him,  as 
well  as  for  him  ;  and  nearly  ten  years  of  her  life  had 
been  exalted  into  one  golden  dream  by  his  companionship. 
A.t  length  came  the  day  which  severed  the  connection  ; 
and  she,  in  the  anguish  of  the  separation,  bewailing  her 
future  loneliness,  and  knowing  too  well  that  education  and 
the  world,  if  it  left  him  some  kind  remembrances  of  her, 
never  could  restore  him  to  her  arms  the  same  fond  loving 


THE  SABACEN  S  HEAD. 


479 


boy  tliat  felt  no  shame  in  surrendering  his  whole  heart  to 
caressing  and  being  caressed,  did  not  revert  to  any  day  or 
season  of  her  ten  years'  happiness,  but  went  back  to  the 
veiy  day  of  his  arrival,  a  particular  Thursday,  and  to  an 
hour  when,  as  yet,  she  had  not  seen  him,  exclaiming  — 
'  O  that  Thursday  !  O  that  it  could  come  back  !  that 
Thursday  when  the  chaise-wheels  were  ringing  in  the 
streets  of  Keswick ;  when  yet  I  had  not  seen  his  bonny 
face  ;  but  when  he  was  coming  ! ' 

Ay,  reader,  all  this  may  sound  foolishness  to  you,  that 
perhaps  never  had  a  heartache,  or  that  may  have  all  your 
blessings  to  come.  But  now  let  me  return  to  my  narra- 
tive. After  about  twelve  months'  interval,  and  therefore 
again  in  November,  but  November  of  the  year  1808,  I 
repeated  my  visit  to  Wordsworth,  and  upon  a  longer  scale. 
I  found  him  removed  from  his  cottage  to  a  house  of  con- 
siderable size,  about  three-quarters  of  a  mile  distant,  called 
Allan  Bank.  This  house  had  been  very  recently  erected, 
at  an  expense  of  about  £1500,  by  a  gentleman  from  Liv- 
erpool, a  merchant,  and  also  a  lawyer  in  some  department 
or  other.  It  was  not  yet  completely  finished ;  and  an  odd 
accident  was  reported  to  me  as  having  befallen  it  in  its 
earliest  stage.  The  walls  had  been  finished,  and  this 
event  was  to  be  celebrated  at  the  village  inn  with  an 
ovation,  previously  to  the  triumph  that  would  follow  on 
the  roof-raising.  The  workmen  had  all  housed  themselves 
at  the  Red  Lion,  and  were  beginning  their  carouse,  when 
up  rode  a  traveller,  who  brought  them  the  unseasonable 
lews,  that,  whilst  riding  along  the  vale,  he  had  beheld  the 
loTvnfall  of  the  whole  building.  Out  the  men  rushed, 
hoping  that  this  might  be  a  hoax  ;  but  too  surely  they 
lound  his  report  true,  and  their  own  festival  premature.  A 
little  malice  mingled  unavoidably  with  the  laughter  of  the 
Dalesmen ;  for  it  happened  that  the  Liverpool  gentleman 


i80 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


had  offered  a  sort  of  insult  to  the  native  artists,  by  bring- 
ing down  both  masons  and  carpenters  from  his  own  town , 
an  unwise  plan,  for  they  were  necessarily  unacquainted 
with  many  points  of  local  skill ;  and  it  was  to  some 
ignorance  in  their  mode  of  laying  the  stones  that  the 
accident  was  due.  The  house  had  one  or  two  capital 
defects  —  it  was  cold,  damp,  and,  to  all  appearance, 
incurably  smoky.  Upon  this  latter  defect,  by  the  way, 
Wordsworth  founded  a  claim,  not  for  diminution  of  rent, 
but  absolutely  for  entire  immunity  from  any  rent  at  all. 
It  was  truly  comical  to  hear  him  argue  the  point  with  the 
Liverpool  proprietor,  Mr.  C.  He  went  on  dilating  on  the 
hardship  of  living  in  such  a  house ;  of  the  injury,  or 
suffering,  at  least,  sustained  by  the  eyes ;  until,  at  last,  he 
had  drawn  a  picture  of  himself  as  a  very  ill  used  man ; 
and  I  seriously  expected  to  hear  him  sum  up  by  demand- 
ing a  round  sum  for  damages.  Mr.  C.  was  a  very  good- 
natured  man,  calm,  and  gentlemanlike  in  his  manners. 
He  had  also  a  considerable  respect  for  Wordsworth, 
derived,  it  may  be  supposed,  not  from  his  writings,  but 
from  the  authority  (which  many  more  besides  him  could 
not  resist)  of  his  conversation.  However,  he  looked  grave 
and  perplexed.  Nor  do  I  know  how  the  matter  ended ; 
but  I  mention  it  as  an  illustration  of  Wordsworth's  keen 
spirit  of  business.  Whilst  foolish  people  supposed  him  a 
mere  honeyed  sentimentalist,  speaking  only  in  zephyrs  and 
bucolics,  he  was  in  fact  a  somewhat  hard  pursuer  of  what 
he  thought  fair  advantages. 

In  the  February  which  followed,  I  left  Allan  Bank  ;  but 
upon  Miss  Wordsworth's  happening  to  volunteer  the  task 
of  furnishing  for  my  use  the  cottage  so  recently  occupied 
by  her  brother's  family,  I  took  it  upon  a  seven  years' 
lease.  And  thus  it  happened  —  this  I  mean  was  the  mode 
of  it,  (for,  at  any  rate,  I  should  have  settled  somewhere  in 
the  country,)  that  I  became  a  resident  in  Grasmere. 


BOCI£Xl   OF  THE  LAKES. 


481 


CHAPTER  XVIL 

SOCIETY  OF  THE  LAKES. 


In  February,  as  I  have  said,  of  1809,  I  quitted  Allan 
Bank  ;  and,  from  that  time  until  the  depth  of  summer, 
Miss  Wordsworth  was  employed  in  the  task  she  had 
volunteered,  of  renewing  and  furnishing  the  little  cottage 
in  which  I  was  to  succeed  the  illustrious  tenant  who  had, 
in  my  mind,  hallowed  the  rooms  by  a  seven  years'  occu- 
pation, during  perhaps,  the  happiest  period  of  his  life 
—  the  early  years  of  his  marriage,  and  of  his  first  ac- 
quaintance with  parental  affections.  Cottage,  immortal 
in  my  remembrance !  as  well  it  might  be ;  for  this  cottage 
I  retained  through  just  seven-and-twenty  years  :  this  was 
the  scene  of  struggle  the  most  tempestuous  and  bitter 
within  my  own  mind :  this  the  scene  of  my  despondency 
and  unhappiness :  this  the  scene  of  my  happiness  —  a 
happiness  which  justified  the  faith  of  man's  earthly  lot, 
as,  upon  the  whole,  a  dowry  from  heaven.  It  was,  in  its 
exterior,  not  so  much  a  picturesque  cottage  —  for  its 
outline  and  proportions,  its  windows  and  its  chimneys, 
were  not  sufficiently  marked  and  effective  for  the  pic- 
turesque ^'  —  as  it  was  lovely  :  one  gable  end  was,  indeed, 

*  The  idea  of  the  picturesque  is  one  which  did  not  exist  at  all  until 
the  post-Christian  ages;  neither  amongst  the  Grecians  nor  amongst 
the  Romans;  and  </iere/bre,  as  respects  one  reason,  it  was,  that  the 
art  of  landscape  painting  did  not  exist  (except  in  a  Chinese  infancy, 
31 


482 


LITERABY  REMINISCENCES. 


most  gorgeously  apparelled  in  ivy,  and  so  far  picturesque ; 
but  the  principal  side,  or  what  might  be  called  front,  as  it 

and  as  a  mere  trick  of  inventive  ingenuity)  amongst  the  finest  artists 
of  Greece.  What  is  picturesque,  as  placed  in  relation  to  the  beautiful 
and  the  sublime  ?  It  is  (to  define  it  by  the  very  shortest  form  ot 
words)  the  characteristic,  pushed  into  a  sensible  excess.  The  pre- 
vailing character  of  any  natural  object,  no  matter  how  little  attrac- 
tive it  may  be  for  beauty,  is  always  interesting  for  itself,  as  the 
character  and  hieroglyphic  symbol  of  the  purposes  pursued  by 
Nature  in  the  determination  of  its  form,  style  of  motion,  texture  of 
superficies,  relation  of  parts,  &c. 

Thus,  for  example,  an  expression  of  dulness  and  somnolent  torpor 
does  not  ally  itself  with  grace  or  elegance;  but,  in  combination  with 
strength  and  other  qualities,  it  may  compose  a  character  of  service- 
able and  patient  endurance,  as  in  the  cart-horse,  having  unity  in  itself, 
and  tending  to  one  class  of  uses  sufficient  to  mark  it  out  by  circum- 
Bcription  for  a  distinct  and  separate  contemplation.  Now,  in  com- 
bination with  certain  counteracting  circumstances,  as  with  the 
momentary  enei-gy  of  some  great  effort,  much  of  this  peculiar  char- 
acter might  be  lost,  or  defeated,  or  dissipated.  On  that  account,  the 
skilful  observer  will  seek  out  circumstances  that  are  in  harmony  with 
the  principal  tendencies  and  assist  them ;  such,  suppose,  as  a  state  of 
lazy  relaxation  from  labor,  and  the  fall  of  heavy  drenching  rain 
causing  the  head  to  droop,  and  the  shaggy  mane,  together  with  the 
fetlocks,  to  weep.  These,  and  other  circumstances  of  attitude,  &c., 
bring  out  the  character  or  prevailing  tendency  of  the  animal  in  some 
excess;  and,  in  such  a  case,  we  call  the  resulting  effect  to  the  eye  — 
picturesque  :  or  in  fact,  characieresque.  In  extending  this  specula- 
tion to  objects  of  art  and  human  purposes,  there  is  something  more 
required  of  subtle  investigation.  Meantime,  it  is  evident  that  neither 
the  sublime  nor  the  beautiful  depends  upon  any  secondary  interest 
of  a  purpose  or  of  a  character  expressing  that  purpose.  They  (con- 
fining the  case  to  visual  objects)  court  the  primary  interest  involved 
in  that  (form,  color,  texture,  attitude,  motion),  which  forces  admira- 
tion, which  fascinates  the  eye,  for  itself,  and  without  a  question  of 
any  distinct  purpose:  and,  instead  of  character  —  that  is,  discrimi- 
nating and  separating  expression,  tending  to  the  special  and  the 
Individual  —  they  both  agree  in  pursuing  the  Catholic  —  the  Normivi 
—  the  Ideal. 


SOCIETY  OF  THE  LAKES. 


483 


presented  itself  to  the  road,  and  was  most  illuminated  by 
windows,  was  embossed  —  nay,  it  might  be  said,  smothered 
' — in  roses  of  different  species,  amongst  which  the  moss 
and  the  damask  prevailed.  These,  together  with  as  much 
jessamine  and  honeysuckle  as  could  find  room  to  flourish, 
were  not  only  in  themselves  a  most  interesting  garniture 
for  a  humble  cottage  wall,  but  they  also  performed  the 
acceptable  service  of  breaking  the  unpleasant  glare  that 
would  else  have  wounded  the  eye,  from  the  whitewash ;  a 
glare  which,  having  been  renewed  amongst  the  general 
preparations  against  my  coming  to  inhabit  the  house,  could 
not  be  sufficiently  subdued  in  tone  for  the  artist's  eye 
until  the  storm  of  several  winters  had  weather-stained 
and  tamed  down  its  brilliancy.  The  Westmoreland 
cottages,  as  a  class,  have  long  been  celebrated  for  their 
picturesque  forms,  and  very  justly  so  :  in  no  part  of  the 
world  are  cottages  to  be  found  more  strikingly  interesting 
to  the  eye  by  their  general  outlines,  by  the  sheltered 
porches  of  their  entrances,  by  their  exquisite  chimneys,  b} 
their  rustic  windows,  and  by  the  distribution  of  the  parts 
These  parts  are  on  a  larger  scale,  both  as  to  number  and 
size,  than  a  stranger  would  expect  to  find  as  dependencies 
and  out-houses  attached  to  dwelling-houses  so  modest ; 
chiefly  from  the  necessity  of  making  provision,  both  in 
fuel  for  themselves,  and  in  hay,  straw,  and  brackens  for 
the  cattle  against  the  long  winter.  But,  in  praising  the 
Westmoreland  dwellings,  it  must  be  understood  that  only 
those  of  the  native  Dalesmen  are  contemplated ;  for  as  to 
those  raised  by  the  alien  intruders  —  '  the  lakers,'  or 
^  foreigners '  as  they  are  sometimes  called  by  the  old 
indigenous  possessors  of  the  soil  —  these  being  designed 
to  exhibit  '  a  taste  '  and  an  eye  for  the  picturesque,  are 
pretty  often  mere  models  of  deformity,  as  vulgar  and  as 
liily  as  it  is  well  possible  for  any  object  to  be,  in  a  ease 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


where,  after  all,  tlie  workman,  and  obedience  to  custom, 
and  the  necessities  of  the  ground,  &c.,  will  often  step  in 
to  compel  the  architects  into  common  sense  and  propriety. 
The  main  defect  in  Scottish  scenery,  the  eyesore  that 
disfigures  so  many  charming  combinations  of  landscape, 
is  the  offensive  style  '  f  the  rural  architecture  ;  but  still, 
even  where  it  is  worst,  the  mode  of  its  offence  is  not  by 
affectation  and  conceit,  and  preposterous  attempts  at  real- 
izing sublime,  Gothic,  or  castellated  effects  in  little  ginger- 
bread ornaments,  and  '  tobacco  pipes,'  and  make-believe 
parapets,  and  towers  like  kitchen  or  hot-house  flues  ;  but 
in  the  hard  undisguised  pursuit  of  mere  coarse  uses  and 
needs  of  life. 

Too  often,  the  rustic  mansion,  that  should  speak  of 
decent  poverty  and  seclusion,  peaceful  and  comfortable, 
wears  the  most  repulsive  air  of  town  confinement  and 
squalid  indigence  ;  the  house  being  built  of  substantial 
Btone,  three  stories  high,  or  even  four,  the  roof  of  massy 
«late ;  and  everything  strong  which  respects  the  future 
outlay  of  the  proprietor  —  everything  frail  which  respects 
the  comfort  of  the  inhabitants ;  windows  broken  and 
stuffed  up  with  rags  or  old  hats  ;  steps  and  door  encrusted 
with  dirt ;  and  the  whole  tarnished  with  smoke.  Poverty 
—  how  different  the  face  it  wears  looking  with  meagre 
staring  eyes  from  such  a  city  dwelling  as  this,  and  when 
it  peeps  out,  with  rosy  cheeks,  from  amongst  clustering 
••OSes  and  woodbines,  at  a  little  lattice,  from  a  little  one- 
.4tory  cottage  !  Are,  then,  the  main  characteristics  of  the 
Westmoreland  dwelling-houses  imputable  to  superior 
taste  ?  By  no  means.  Spite  of  all  that  I  have  heard 
Mr.  Wordsworth  and  others  say  in  maintaining  that  opin- 
ion>  I,  for  my  part,  do  and  must  hold,  tnat  the  Dalesmen 
oroduce  none  of  the  happy  effects  which  frequently  arise 
JQ  their  domest'c  architecture  under   any  search  after 


SOCIETY  OF  THE  LAKES. 


485 


Desutiful  forms,  a  search,  which  they  despise  with  a  sort 
af  Vandai  dignity  ;  no,  nor  with  ^ny  sense  or  conscious* 
tiess  of  their  success.  How  then  t  Is  it  accident  —  mere 
casual  good  luck  —  that  has  brought  forth,  for  instance, 
80  many  exquisite  forms  of  chimneys  ?  Not  so  ;  but  it  is 
this  :  it  is  good  sense,  on  the  one  hand,  bending  and 
conforming  to  the  dictates  or  even  the  suggestions  of  the 
climate,  and  the  local  circumstances  of  rocks,  water,  cur- 
rents of  air,  &c. ;  and,  on  the  other  hand,  wealth  sufficient 
to  arm  the  builder  with  all  suitable  means  for  giving  effect 
to  his  purpose,  and  to  evade  the  necessity  of  make-shifts. 
But  the  radical  ground  of  the  interest  attached  to  West- 
moreland cottage  architecture,  lies  in  its  submission  to 
the  determining  agencies  of  the  surrounding  circum- 
stances ;  such  of  them,  I  mean,  as  are  permanent,  and 
have  been  gathered  from  long  experience.  The  porch,  for 
instance,  which  does  so  much  to  take  away  from  a  house 
the  character  of  a  rude  box,  pierced  with  holes  for  air, 
light,  and  ingress,  has  evidently  been  dictated  by  the  sud- 
den rushes  of  wind  through  the  mountain  '  ghylls,'  which 
make  some  kind  of  protection  necessary  to  the  ordinary 
door  ;  and  this  reason  has  been  strengthened  in  cases  of 
houses  near  to  a  road,  by  the  hospitable  wish  to  provide  a 
sheltered  seat  for  the  wayfarer  ;  most  of  these  porches  being 
"urnished  with  one  in  each  of  the  two  recesses,  to  the 
'ght  and  to  the  left. 

The  long  winter  again,  as  I  have  already  said,  and  th^ 
artificial  prolongation  of  the  winter,  by  the  necessity  of 
keeping  the  sheep  long  upon  the  low  grounds,  creates  a 
call  for  large  out-houses ;  and  these,  for  the  sake  of 
warmth,  are  usually  placed  at  right  angles  to  the  house  : 
v«hich  the  effect  of  making  a  much  larger  system  of  parts 
ttian  would  else  arise.  But  perhaps  the  main  feature, 
which  gives  character  to  the  pile  of  building,  is  the  roof, 


486  LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 

Iind,  above  all,  the  chimneys.  It  is  the  remark  of  an 
accomplished  Edinburgh  artist,  H.  W.  Williams,  in  the 
course  of  his  strictures^  upon  the  domestic  architecture 
of  the  Italians,  and  especially  of  the  Florentines,  that  the 
character  of  buildings,  in  certain  circumstances,  '  depends 
wholly  or  chiefly  on  the  form  of  the  roof  and  the  chimney. 
This,'  he  goes  on,  '  is  particularly  the  case  in  Italy,  where 
more  variety  and  taste  is  displayed  in  the  chimneys  than 
in  the  buildings  to  which  they  belong.  These  chimneys 
are  as  peculiar  and  characteristic  as  palm  trees  in  a 
tropical  climate.'  Again,  in  speaking  of  Calabria  and  the 
Ionian  Islands,  he  says  —  '  We  were  forcibly  struck  with 
the  consequence  which  the  beauty  of  the  chimneys  im- 
parted to  the  character  of  the  whole  building.'  Now,  in 
Great  Britain,  be  complains,  with  reason,  of  the  very 
opposite  result ;  not  the  plain  building  ennobled  by  the 
chimney  ;  but  the  chimney  degrading  the  noble  building ; 
and  in  Edinburgh,  especially,  where  the  homely  and  inel- 
egant appearance  of  the  chimneys  contrasts  most  disadvan- 
tageously  and  offensively  with  the  beauty  of  the  buildings 
which  they  surmount.'  Even  here,  however,  he  makes 
an  exception  for  some  of  the  old  buildings,  whose  chim- 
neys,' he  admits,  '  are  very  tastefully  decorated,  and  con- 
tribute essentially  to  the  beauty  of  the  general  effect.'  It 
is  probable,  therefore,  and  many  houses  of  the  Elizabethan 
era  confirm  it,  tnat  a  better  taste  prevailed,  in  this  point, 
amongst  our  ancestors,  both  Scottish  and  English  ;  that 
this  elder  fashion  travelled,  together  with  many  other 
usages,  from  the  richer  parts  of  Scotland  to  the  Borders, 
and  thence  to  the  vales  of  Westmoreland  ;  where  they 
have  continued  to  prevail,  from  their  affectionate  adhesion 
to  all  patriarchal  customs.    Some,  undoubtedly,  of  these 

♦  Travels  in  Italy,  Greece,  and  the  Ionian  Islands,  vol.  i.  p.  74, 76 


SOCIETY  OF  THE  LAKES. 


487 


VVestmoreland  forms  have  been  dictated  by  the  neces- 
sities of  the  weather,  and  the  systematic  energies  of 
human  skill,  from  age  to  age,  applied  to  the  very  difficult 
task  of  training  smoke  into  obedience,  under  the  peculiai' 
difficulties  presented  by  the  sites  of  Westmoreland  houses. 
These  are  chosen,  generally  speaking,  with  the  same  good 
sense  and  regard  to  domestic  comfort,  as  the  primary  con- 
sideration  (without,  however,  disdainfully  slighting  the 
sentiment,  whatever  it  were,  of  peace,  of  seclusion,  of 
gayety,  of  solemnity,  the  special '  religio  loci ')  which  seems 
to  have  guided  the  choice  of  those  who  founded  religious 
houses. 

And  here,  again,  by  the  way,  appears  a  marked  dif- 
ference between  the  Dalesmen  and  the  intrusive  gentry  — 
not  creditable  to  the  latter.  The  native  Dalesmen,  well 
aware  of  the  fury  with  which  the  wind  often  gathers  and 
eddies  about  any  eminence,  however  trifling  its  elevation, 
never  thinks  of  planting  his  house  there :  whereas  the 
stranger,  singly  solicitous  about  the  prospect  or  the  range 
of  lake  which  his  gilt  saloons  are  to  command,  chooses 
his  site  too  often  upon  points  better  fitted  for  a  temple  of 
Eolus  than  a  human  dwelling-place  ;  and  he  belts  his 
house  with  balconies  and  verandas  that  a  mountain  gale 
often  tears  away  in  mockery.  The  Dalesman,  wherever 
his  choice  is  not  circumscribed,  selects  a  sheltered  spot, 
(a  wray,"^'  for  instance,)  which  protects  him  from  the  wind 
altogether,  upon  one  or  two  quarters,  and  on  all  quarters 
from  its  tornado  violence :  he  takes  good  care,  at  the  same 
time,  to  be  within  a  few  feet  of  a  mountain  beck  :  a  caution 
BO  little  heeded  by  some  of  the  villa  founders,  that  abso- 
lutely, in  a  country  surcharged  with  water,  they  have  some- 

*  TVraie  is  the  old  Danish,  or  Icelandic  word  for  angle,  Hencf 
the  many  *  wrays '  in  the  lake  district. 


488 


I^ITEEARY  EEMINISCENCES. 


times  found  themselves  driven,  by  sheer  necessity,  to  the 
after-thought  of  sinking  a  well.  The  very  best  situation, 
however,  in  other  respects,  may  be  bad  in  one  ;  and  some- 
times find  its  very  advantages,  and  the  beetling  crags  which 
protect  its  rear,  obstructions  the  most  permanent  to  the 
ascent  of  smoke  ;  and  it  is  in  the  contest  with  these  natural 
baffling  repellents  of  the  smoke,  and  in  the  variety  of  arti- 
fices for  modifying  its  vertical,  or  for  accomplishing  its 
lateral  escape,  that  have  arisen  the  large  and  graceful  vari- 
ety of  chimney  models.  My  cottage,  wanting  this  primary 
feature  of  elegance  in  the  constituents  of  Westmoreland 
cottage  architecture,  and  wanting  also  another  very  in- 
teresting feature  of  the  elder  architecture,  annually  be- 
coming more  and  more  rare,  viz.  the  outside  gallery, 
(which  is  sometimes  merely  of  wood,  but  is  much  more 
striking  when  provided  for  in  the  original  construction  of 
the  house,  and  completely  enfonce  in  the  masonry,)  could 
not  rank  high  amongst  the  picturesque  houses  of  the 
country ;  those,  at  least,  which  are  such  by  virtue  of  their 
architectural  form.  It  was,  however,  very  irregular  in  its 
outline  to  the  rear,  by  the  aid  of  one  little  projecting 
room,  and  also  of  a  stable  and  little  barn,  in  immediate 
contact  with  the  dwelling-house.  It  had,  besides,  the  great 
advantage  of  a  varying  height :  two  sides  being  about 
fifteen  or  sixteen  feet  high  from  the  exposure  of  both 
stories ;  whereas  the  other  two  being  swathed  about  by  a 
little  orchard  that  rose  rapidly  and  unequally  towards  the 
vast  mountain  range  in  the  rear,  exposed  only  the  upper 
story  ;  and,  consequently,  on  those  sides  the  elevation 
rarely  rose  beyond  seven  or  eight  feet.  All  these  acci- 
dents of  irregular  form  and  outline,  gave  to  the  house 
gome  little  pretensions  to  a  picturesque  character  ;  whilst 
its  '  separable  accidents '  (as  the  logicians  say)  —  its 
bowery  roses  and  jessamine  clothed  it  in  loveliness  —  it^ 


SOCIETY  OF  THE  LA^KES. 


489 


associations  with  Wordsworth  —  crowned  it,  to  my  mind, 
with  historical  dignity ;  and,  finally,  my  own  twenty-seven 
years  off-and-on  connection  with  it,  have,  by  ties  personal 
and  indestructible,  endeared  it  to  my  heart  so  unspeakably 
bevond  all  other  houses,  that  even  now  I  rarely  dream 
through  four  nights  running,  that  I  do  not  find  myself 
(and  others  beside)  in  some  one  of  those  rooms  ;  and, 
most  probably,  the  last  cloudy  delirium  of  approaching 
death  will  re-install  me  in  some  chamber  of  that  same 
humble  cottage.  '  What  a  tale,'  says  Foster,  the  eloquent 
essayist  —  '  what  a  tale  could  be  told  by  many  a  room, 
were  the  walls  endowed  with  memory  and  speech  ! '  or, 
in  the  more  impassioned  expressions  of  Wordsworth  — 

Ah  !  what  a  lesson  to  a  thoughtless  man 

 if  any  gladsome  field  of  earth 

Could  render  back  the  sighs  to  which  it  hath  responded, 
Or  echo  the  sad  steps  by  which  it  hath  been  trod  ! ' 

And  equally  affecting  it  would  be,  if  such  a  field  or  sucn 
a  house  could  render  up  the  echoes  of  joy,  of  festal  music, 
of  jubilant  laughter  —  the  innocent  mirth  of  infants,  or 
the  gayety,  not  less  innocent,  of  youthful  mothers  — 
equally  affecting  would  be  such  a  reverberation  of  for- 
gotten household  happiness,  with  the  re-echoing  records 
of  sighs  and  groans.  And  few  indeed  are  the  houses  that, 
within  a  period  no  longer  than  from  the  beginning  of  the 
century  to  1835  (so  long  was  it  either  mine  or  Words- 
worth's) have  crowded  such  ample  materials  for  thosf 
echoes,  whether  sorrowful  or  joyous. 


SOCIETY    OF    THE  LAKES. 


My  cottage  was  ready  in  the  summer  ;  but  I  was  play- 
lug  truant  amongst  Id**  valleys  of  Somersetshire;  and, 


"LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


meantime,  different  families,  throngliout  tlie  summer,  bov 
rowed  the  cottage  of  the  Wordsworths  as  my  friends  ;  they 
consisted  chiefly  of  ladies  ;  and  some,  by  the  delicacy  of 
their  attentions  to  the  flowers,  &c.,  gave  me  reason  to  con- 
sider their  visit  during  my  absence  as  a  real  honor  ;  others 
—  such  is  the  diflerence  of  people  in  this  world  —  left  the 
rudest  memorials  of  their  careless  habits  impressed  upon 
house,  furniture,  garden,  &c.  In  November,  at  last,  I, 
the  long-expected,  mad^  my  appearance  ;  some  little  sen- 
sation did  really  and  na\.  irally  attend  my  coming,  for  most 
of  the  draperies  belonging  to  beds,  curtains,  &c.,  had 
been  sewed  by  the  young  women  of  that  or  the  adjoining 
vales.  This  had  caused  me  to  be  talked  of.  Many  had 
seen  me  on  my  visit  to  the  Wordsworths.  Miss  Words- 
worth had  introduced  the  curious  to  a  knowledge  of  my 
age,  name,  prospects,  and  all  the  rest  of  what  can  be  inter* 
esting  to  know.  Even  the  old  people  of  the  vale  were  a 
little  excited  by  the  accounts  (somewhat  exaggerated,  per- 
haps) of  the  never  ending  books  that  continued  to  arrive  in 
packing-cases  for  several  months  in  succession.  Nothing 
in  these  vales  so  much  fixes  the  attention  and  respect  of 
the  people  as  the  reputation  of  being  a  '  far  learn' d  '  man. 
So  far,  therefore,  I  had  already  bespoke  the  favorable 
opinion  of  the  Dalesmen.  And  a  separate  kind  of  interest 
arose  amongst  mothers  and  daughters,  in  the  knowledge 
that  I  should  necessarily  want  what  —  in  a  sense  somewhat 
difi'erent  from  the  general  one  —  is  called  a  '  housekeeper ; ' 
that  is,  not  an  upper  servant  to  superintend  others,  but  one 
who  could  undertake,  in  her  own  person,  all  the  duties  of 
the  house.  It  is  not  discreditable  to  these  worthy  people 
that  several  of  the  richest  and  most  respectable  families 
were  anxious  to  secure  the  place  for  a  daughter.  Had  ' 
been  a  dissipated  young  man,  I  have  good  reason  to  know 
*hat  there  would  have  been  no  canvassing  at  all  for  th^ 


SOCIETY  OF  THE  LAKES. 


491 


Bituation.  But  partly  my  books  spoke  for  ihe  character  of 
my  pursuits  with  these  simple-minded  people  —  partly  the 
introduction  of  the  Wordsworths  guaranteed  the  safety  of 
such  a  service.  Even  then,  had  I  persisted  in  my  original 
intention  of  bringing  a  man-servant,  no  respectable  young 
woman  would  have  accepted  the  place.  As  it  was,  and  it 
being  understood  that  I  had  renounced  this  intention,  many, 
in  a  gentle,  diffident  way,  appli'^d  for  the  place,  or  their 
parents  on  their  behalf.  And  I  mention  the  fact,  beause 
it  illustrates  one  feature  in  the  manners  of  this  primitive 
and  peculiar  people,  the  Dalesmen  of  Westmoreland. 
However  wealthy,  they  do  not  think  it  degrading  to  permit 
even  the  eldest  daughter  to  go  out  a  few  years  to  service. 
The  object  is  not  to  gain  a  sum  of  money  in  wages,  but 
that  sort  of  household  experience  which  is  supposed  to  be 
unattainable  upon  a  suitable  scale  out  of  a  gentleman's 
family.  So  far  was  this  carried,  that,  amongst  the  offers 
made  to  myself,  was  one  from  a  young  woman  whose 
family  was  amongst  the  very  oldest  in  the  country,  and  who 
was  at  that  time  under  an  engagement  of  marriage  to  the 
very  richest  young  man  in  the  vale.  She  and  her  future 
husband  had  a  reasonable  prospect  of  possessing  ten  thou- 
sand pounds  in  land  ;  and  yet  neither  her  own  family  nor 
lier  husband's  objected  to  her  seeking  such  a  place  as  I 
^ould  offer.  Her  character  and  manners,  I  ought  to  add, 
A^ere  so  truly  excellent,  and  won  respect  so  inevitably  from 
jverybody  that  nobody  could  wonder  at  the  honorable 
onfidence  reposed  in  her  by  her  manly  and  spirited  young 
iover.  The  issue  of  the  matter,  as  respected  my  service. 
A^as,  why  I  do  not  know,  that  Miss  Wordsworth  did  not 
Accept  of  her :  and  she  fulfilled  her  purpose  in  another 
/amily,  a  very  grave  and  respectable  one,  in  Kendal.  She 
itayed  about  a  couple  of  years,  returned,  and  married  the 
foung  man  to  whom  she  had  engaged  herself,  and  is  now 


492 


LIIERAKY  REMINISCENCES. 


the  prosperous  mother  of  a  fine  handsome  family ;  and 
she  together  with  her  mother-in-law,  are  the  two  leading 
matrons  of  the  vale. 

It  was  on  a  November  night,  about  ten  o'clock,  that  1 
first  found  myself  installed  in  a  house  of  my  own  —  this 
cottage,  so  memorable  from  its  past  tenant  to  all  men,  so 
memorable  to  myself  from  all  which  has  since  past  in  con- 
nection with  it.  A  writer  in  The  Quarterly  Review^  in 
noticing  the  autobiography  of  Dr.  Watson,  the  Bishop  of 
Llandaff,  has  thought  fit  to  say  that  the  lakes,  of  course, 
afforded  no  society  capable  of  appreciating  this  common- 
place, coarse-minded  man  of  talents.  The  person  who 
said  this  I  understand  to  have  been  Dr.  Whitaker,  the  re- 
spectable antiquary.  Now,  that  the  reader  may  judge  of 
the  propriety  with  which  this  was  asserted,  I  shall  slightly 
rehearse  the  muster-roll  of  our  lake  society,  as  it  existed  at 
the  time  when  I  seated  myself  in  my  Grasmere  cottage. 
I  will  undertake  to  say,  that  the  meanest  person  in  the 
whole  scattered  community  was  more  extensively  accom- 
plished than  the  good  bishop,  was  more  conscientiously  true 
to  his  duties,  and  had  more  varied  powers  of  conversation. 
"Wordsworth  and  Coleridge,  then  living  at  Allan  Bank,  in 
Grasmere,  I  will  not  notice  in  such  a  question.  Southey, 
living  thirteen  miles  off,  at  Keswick,  I  have  already  noticed ; 
and  he  needs  no  proneur.  I  ^vill  begin  with  Windermere. 
At  Clappersgate,  a  little  hamlet  of  perhaps  six  houses,  on 
its  north-west  angle,  and  about  five  miles  from  my  cottage, 
resided  two  Scottish  ladies,  daughters  of  Dr.  Cullen,  the 
famous  physician  and  nosologist.  They  were  universally 
beloved  for  their  truly  kind  dispositions  and  the  firm  inde- 
pendence  of  their  conduct.  They  had  been  reduced  frore. 
great  affluence  to  a  condition  of  rigorous  poverty.  Their 
father  had  made  what  should  have  been  a  fortune  by  hia 
practice.    The  good  doctor,  howe-ver,  was  careless  of  his 


SOCIETY  OF  THE  LAKES. 


493 


money  in  proportion  to  the  facility  with  which  he  made  it. 
All  was  put  into  a  box,  open  to  the  whole  family.  Breach 
of  confidence,  in  the  most  thoughtless  use  of  this  money, 
there  could  he  none  ;  because  no  retraint  in  that  point, 
beyond  what  honor  and  good  sense  imposed,  was  laid  upon 
any  of  the  elder  children.  Under  such  regulations,  it  may 
be  imagined  that  Dr.  Cullen  would  not  accumulate  any 
very  large  capital ;  and,  at  his  death,  the  family,  for  the 
first  time,  found  themselves  in  embarrassed  circumstances. 
Of  the  two  daughters  who  belonged  to  our  lake  population, 
one  had  married  a  Mr.  Millar,  son  to  the  celebrated  pro- 
fessor Millar,  of  Glasgow.  This  gentleman  had  died  in 
America ;  and  Mrs.  Millar  was  now  a  childless  widow. 
The  other  still  remained  unmarried.  Both  were  equally 
independent ;  and  independent  even  with  regard  to  their 
nearest  relatives  ;  for,  even  from  their  brother  —  who  had 
risen  tu  rank  and  affluence  as  a  Scottish  judge,  under 
the  title  of  Lord  Cullen  —  they  declined  to  receive  assist- 
ance ;  and  except  for  some  small  addition  made  to  their 
income  by  a  novel  called  '  Home,'  [in  as  many  as  seven 
volumes,  I  really  believe,]  by  Miss  Cullen,  their  expendi- 
ture was  rigorously  shaped  to  meet  that  very  slender 
income,  which  they  drew  from  their  shares  of  the  patri- 
monial wrecks.  More  honorable  and  modest  indepen- 
dence, or  poverty  more  gracefully  supported,  I  have  rarely 
known. 

Meantime,  these  ladies,  though  literary  and  very  agree- 
able in  conversation,  could  not  be  classed  with  what  now 
began  to  be  known  as  the  lake  community  of  literati  ;  for 
they  I  ok  no  interest  in  any  one  of  the  lake  poets ;  did  not 
affect  o  take  any  ;  and  I  am  sure  they  were  not  aware  of 
so  niL  ;h  value  in  any  one  thing  these  poets  had  written,  as 
couJ^i  nake  it  worth  while  even  to  look  into  their  books  ; 
and  »  xjordingly  as  well-bred  women,  they  took  the  same 


494 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


course  as  was  pursued  for  several  years  by  Mrs.  ITannah 
More,  viz.  cautiously  to  avoid  mentioning  their  names  in 
my  presence.  This  was  natural  enough  in  women  who 
had  probably  built  their  early  admiration  upon  French 
models,  (for  Mrs.  Millar  used  to  tell  me  that  she  regarded 
the  'Mahomet'  of  Voltaire  as  the  most  perfect  of  human 
compositions,)  and  still  more  so  at  a  period  when  almost 
all  the  world  had  surrendered  their  opinions  and  their 
literary  consciences  (so  to  speak)  into  the  keeping  of  The 
Edinburgh  Revieic  ;  in  whose  favor,  besides,  those  ladies 
had  the  pardonable  prepossessions  of  national  pride,  as  a 
collateral  guarantee  of  that  implicit  faith,  which,  in  those 
days,  stronger-minded  people  than  they  took  a  pride  in 
professing.  Still,  in  defiance  of  prejudices  mustering  so 
strongly  to  support  their  blindness,  and  the  still  stronger 
support  which  this  blindness  drew  from  their  total  igno- 
rance of  everything  either  done  or  attempted  by  the  lake 
poets,  these  amiable  women  persisted  in  one  uniform  tone 
of  courteous  forbearance,  as  often  as  any  question  arose  to 
implicate  the  names  either  of  Wordsworth  or  Coleridge ; 
Eny  question  about  them,  their  books,  their  families,  or 
anything  that  was  theirs.  They  thought  it  strange,  indeed, 
(for  so  much  I  heard  by  a  circuitous  course,)  that  promis- 
ing and  intellectual  young  men — men  educated  at  great 
universities,  such  as  Mr.  Wilson  of  Elleray,  or  myself,  or 
a  few  others  who  had  paid  us  visits,  —  should  possess  so 
deep  a  veneration  for  these  writers ;  but  evidently  this  was 
an  infatuation  —  a  craze,  originating,  perhaps,  in  personal 
connections  ;  and,  as  the  craze  of  valued  friends,  to  be 
treated  with  tenderness.  For  us  therefore  —  for  our  sakes 
—  they  took  a  religious  care  to  suppress  all  allusion  to 
these  disreputable  names ;  and  it  is  pretty  plain  how  sincere 
their  indifference  must  have  been  with  regard  to  these 
neighboring  authors,  from  the  evidence  of  one  fact,  via 


SOCIETr  OF  THE  LAKES. 


495 


that  when,  in  1810,  Mr.  Coleridge  began  to  issue,  in  weekly 
numbers,  his  Friend^  which,  by  the  prospectus,  held  forth 
a  promise  of  meeting  all  possible  tastes  —  literary,  philoso- 
phic, political  —  even  this  comprehensive  field  of  interest, 
combined  with  the  adventitious  attraction  (so  very  unusual, 
and  so  little  to  have  been  looked  for  in  that  thinly-peopled 
region)  of  a  local  origin,  from  the  bosom  of  those  very 
hills,  at  the  foot  of  which  (though  on  a  different  side,  they 
were  themselves  living,  failed  altogether  to  stimulate  theii 
torpid  curiosity  ;  so  perfect  was  their  persuasion  before- 
hand, that  no  good  thing  could  by  possibility  come  out  of 
a  community  that  had  fallen  under  the  ban  of  the  Edin- 
burgh critics. 

At  the  same  time,  it  is  melancholy  to  confess  that,  partly 
from  the  dejection  of  Coleridge ;  his  constant  immersion 
in  opium  at  that  period ;  his  hatred  of  the  duties  he  had 
assumed,  or  at  least  of  their  too  frequent  and  periodical 
recurrence  ;  and  partly  also  from  the  bad  selection  of  topics 
for  a  miscellaneous  audience ;  from  the  heaviness  and  ob- 
scurity with  which  they  were  treated ;  and  from  the  total 
want  of  variety  ;  in  consequence  of  defective  arrangements 
on  his  part  for  ensuring  the  co-operation  of  his  friends  ; 
no  conceivable  act  of  authorship  that  Coleridge  could  have 
perpetrated,  no  possible  overt  act  of  dulness  and  somnolent 
darkness  that  he  could  have  authorized,  was  so  well  fitted 
to  sustain  the  impression,  with  regard  to  him  and  his  friends, 
that  had  pre-occupied  these  ladies'  minds.  Habes  conjiten- 
tern  7^eum  !  I  am  sure  they  would  exclaim  ;  not  perhaps 
confessing  to  that  form  of  delinquency  which  they  had  been 
taught  to  expect  —  trivial  or  extravagant  sentimentalism  ; 
Germanity  alternating  with  tumid  inanity  ;  ftot  this,  but 
something  quite  as  bad  or  worse,  viz.  palpable  dulness  — 
fulness  that  could  be  felt  and  handled  —  rayless  obscurity 
«s  to  the  thought  —  and  communicated  in  language  that, 


496 


LTTEEARY  REMINISCENCES. 


according  to  the  Bishop  of  LlandafF's  complaint,  was  not 
always  English.  For,  though  the  particular  words  citea 
for  blame  were  certainly  known  to  the  vocabulary  of  meta- 
physics, and  had  even  been  employed  by  a  writer  of  Queen 
Anne's  reign,  (Leibnitz,)  who,  if  any,  had  the  gift  of 
translating  dark  thoughts  into  plain  ones  —  still  it  was 
intolerable,  in  point  of  good  sense,  that  one  who  had  to 
win  his  way  into  the  public  ear,  should  begin  by  bringing, 
before  a  popular  and  miscellaneous  audience,  themes  that 
could  require  such  startling  and  revolting  words.  The 
Delphic  Oracle  was  the  kindest  of  the  nicknames  which 
the  literary  taste  of  Windermere  conferred  upon  the  new 
journal.  This  was  the  laughing  suggestion  of  a  clever 
young  lady,  a  daughter  of  the  Bishop  of  LlandafF,  who 
Btood  in  a  neutral  position  with  regard  to  Coleridge.  But 
others  there  were  amongst  his  supposed  friends,  who  felt 
even  more  keenly  than  this  young  lady,  the  shocking 
want  of  adaptation  to  his  audience  in  the  choice  of  matter ; 
and,  even  to  an  audience  better  qualified  to  meet  such 
matter,  the  want  of  adaptation  in  the  mode  of  publication, 
viz.  periodically,  and  by  weekly  recurrence  ;  a  mode  of 
soliciting  the  public  attention  which  even  authorizes  the 
expectation  of  current  topics  —  topics  arising  each  with 
.  ts  own  week  or  day.  One  in  particular  I  remember,  of 
these  disapproving  friends ;  a  Mr.  Blair,  an  accomplished 
scholar,  and  a  frequent  visitor  at  Elleray,  who  started  the 
playful  scheme  of  a  satirical  rejoinder  to  Coleridge's 
Friend^  under  the  name  of  The  Enemy,  which  was  to 
follow  always  in  the  wake  of  its  leader,  and  to  stimulate 
Coleridge,  [at  the  same  time  that  it  amused  the  public,]  by 
attic  banter,  or  by  downright  opposition,  and  shomng  fight 
m  good  earnest.  It  was  a  plan  that  might  have  done  good 
service  to  the  world,  and  chiefiy  through  a  seasonable 
Irritation  (never  so  much  wanted  as  then)  applied  to 


SOCIETY  OF  THE  LAKES. 


497 


Coleridge's  too  lethargic  state  :  in  fact,  throughout  life,  it 
is  most  deeply  to  be  regretted  that  Coleridge's  powers  and 
peculiar  learning  were  never  forced  out  into  a  large  display 
by  intense  and  almost  persecuting  opposition.  However, 
this  scheme,  like  thousands  of  other  day-dreams  and 
bubbles  that  rose  upon  the  breath  of  morning  spirits  and 
buoyant  youth,  fell  to  the  ground ;  and,  in  the  meantime, 
no  enemy  to  Tlie  Friend  appeared  that  was  capable  of 
matching  The  Friend  when  left  to  itself  and  its  own  care- 
less or  vagrant  guidance.  The  Friend  ploughed  heavily 
along  for  nine-and- twenty  numbers  ;  and  our  fair  recusants 
and  non-conformists  in  all  that  regarded  the  lake  poetry 
or  authorship,  the  two  Scottish  ladies  of  Clappersgate, 
found  no  reasons  for  changing  their  opinions ;  but  con- 
tinued, for  the  rest  of  my  acquaintance  with  them,  to 
practise  the  same  courteous  and  indulgent  silence,  when- 
ever the  names  of  Coleridge  or  Wordsworth  happened  to 
be  mentioned. 

In  taking  leave  of  these  Scottish  ladies,  it  may  be  in  - 
tv^resting  to  mention  that,  previously  to  their  final  farewell 
to  our  lake  society,  upon  taking  up  their  permanent 
residence  in  York,  (which  step  they  adopted  —  partly,  I 
believe,  to  enjoy  the  more  diversified  society  which  that 
great  city  yields,  and,  at  any  rate,  the  more  accessible 
society  than  amongst  mountain  districts  —  partly  with  a 
view  to  the  cheapness  of  that  rich  district  in  comparison 
with  our  sterile  soil,  poor  towns,  and  poor  agriculture,) 
somewhere  about  the  May  or  June  of  1810, 1  think  —  they 
were  able,  by  a  long  preparatory  course  of  economy,  to 
invite  to  the  English  lakes  a  family  of  foreigners  —  what 
shall  I  call  them  ?  —  a  family  of  Anglo-Gallo-Americans, 
from  the  Carolinas.  The  invitation  had  been  of  old 
standing,  and  offered,  as  an  expression  of  gratitude,  from 
these  ladies,  for  many  hospitalities  and  friendly  services 
32 


498 


riTERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


rendered  by  the  two  heads  of  that  family  to  Mrs,  Millar, 
in  former  years,  and  under  circumstances  of  peculiar 
trial.  Mrs.  Millar  had  been  hastily  summoned  from  Scot- 
land to  attend  her  husband  at  Charleston ;  him,  on  her 
arrival,  she  found  dying;  and,  whilst  overwhelmed  by 
this  sudden  blow,  it  may  be  imagined  that  the  young 
widow  would  find  trials  enough  for  her  fortitude,  without 
needing  any  addition  to  the  load,  from  friendliness  amongst 
a  nation  of  strangers,  and  from  total  solitude.  These  evils 
were  spared  to  Mrs.  Millar,  through  the  kind  offices  and 
disinterested  exertions  of  an  American  gentleman,  (French 
by  birth,  but  American  by  adoption,)  M.  Simond,  who 
took  upon  himself  the  cares  of  superintending  Mr.  Millar's 
funeral  through  all  its  details  ;  and,  by  this  most  season- 
able service,  secured  to  the  heart-stricken  widow  that  most 
welcome  of  privileges  in  all  situations,  the  privilege  of 
unmolested  privacy  ;  for  assuredly  the  heaviest  aggrava- 
tion of  such  bereavements  lies  in  the  necessity,  too  often 
imposed  by  circumstances,  upon  him  or  upon  her,  who 
may  happen  to  be  the  sole  responsible  representative, 
and,  at  the  same  time,  the  dearest  friend  of  the  deceased, 
of  superintending  the  funeral  arrangements.  In  the  very 
agonies  of  a  new-born  grief,  whilst  the  heart  is  yet  raw 
and  bleeding,  the  mind  not  yet  able  to  comprehend  its 
loss,  the  very  light  of  day  hateful  to  the  eyes  ;  the  neces- 
sity, even  at  such  a  moment  arises,  and  without  a  day's 
delay,  and  of  facing  strangers,  talking  with  strangers^ 
discussing  the  most  empty  details,  with  a  view  to  the  most 
sordid  of  considerations  —  cheapness,  convenience,  custom 
and  local  prejudice  ;  and,  finally,  talking  about  whom  r 
why,  the  very  child,  husband,  wife,  who  has  just  been 
corn  away  ;  and  this,  too,  under  a  consciousness  that  the 
being  so  hallowed  is,  as  to  these  strangers,  an  object 
equally  indifferent  with  any  one  person  whatsoever  that 


SOCIETY  OF  THE  LAKES. 


499 


died  a  thousand  years  ago.  Fortunate,  indeed,  is  tHat 
person  who  has  a  natural  friend,  or,  in  default  of  such  a 
friend,  who  finds  a  volunteer  stepping  forward  to  relieve 
him  from  a  conflict  of  feeling  so  peculiarly  unseasonable. 
Mrs.  Millar  never  forgot  the  service  which  had  been  ren- 
dered to  her  ;  and  she  was  happy  when  M.  Simond,  who 
had  become  a  wealthy  citizen  of  America,  at  length  held 
out  the  prospect  of  coming  to  profit  by  her  hospitable 
attentions,  amongst  that  circle  of  friends  with  whom  she 
and  her  sister  had  surrounded  themselves  in  so  interesting 
a  part  of  England. 

M.  Simond  had  been  a  French  emigrant ;  not,  I  believe, 
so  far  connected  with  the  privileged  orders  of  his  country, 
or  with  any  political  party,  as  to  be  absolutely  forced  out 
of  France  by  danger  or  by  panic  ;  but  he  had  ihared  in 
the  feelings  of  those  who  were.  Revolutionary  France, 
in  the  anarchy  of  the  transition  state,  and  still  heaving  to 
and  fro  with  the  subsiding  shocks  of  the  great  earthquake, 
did  not  suit  him  :  there  was  neither  the  polish  which  he 
sought  in  its  manners,  nor  the  security  which  he  sought 
in  its  institutions.  England  he  did  not  love  ;  but  yet,  if 
not  England,  some  country  which  had  grown  up  from 
English  foundations  was  the  country  for  him  ;  and,  as  he 
augured  no  rest  for  France,  through  some  generations  to 
come,  but  an  endless  succession  of  revolution  to  revolu- 
tion, anarchy  to  anarchy,  he  judged  it  best  that,  having 
expatriated  himself  and  lost  one  country,  he  should 
solemnly  adopt  another.  Accordingly  he  became  an 
American  citizen.  English  he  already  spoke  with  pro- 
priety and  fluency.  And,  finally,  he  cemented  his  English 
connections  by  marrying  an  English  lady,  the  niece  of 
John  Wilkes.  '  What  John  Wilkes  : '  asked  a  lady,  one 
of  a  dinner-party  at  Calgarth,  (the  house  of  Dr.  Watsrm, 
he  celebrated  Bishop  of  Llandaff*,)  upon  the  banks  of 


500 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


Windermere.  —  *  What  John  Wilkes  ?  '  re-eclioed  the 
Bishop,  with  a  vehement  intonation  of  scorn;  '  What 
John  Wilkes,  indeed !  as  if  there  ever  was  more  than  one 
John  Wilkes — fama  super  cethera  notosI'  —  ^O,  my 
Lord,  I  beg  your  pardon,'  said  an  old  lady,  nearly  con- 
nected with  the  Bishop,  '  there  were  two ;  I  knew  one  of 
them  :  he  was  a  little,  ill-looking  man,  and  he  kept  the 

Blue  Boar  at  —  '  At  Flamborough  Head  ! '  roared 

the  Bishop,  with  a  savage  expression  of  disgust.  The 
old  lady,  suspecting  that  some  screw  was  loose  in  the 
matter,  thought  it  prudent  to  drop  the  contest ;  but  she 
murmured,  sotto  voce,  *  No,  not  at  Flamborough  Head, 
but  at  Market  Drayton.'  Madame  Simond,  then,  was  the 
niece,  not  of  the  ill-looking  host  of  the  Blue  Boar,  but  of 
the  Wilkes,  so  memorably  connected  with  the  parvanimi- 
ties  of  the  English  government  at  one  period  ;  with  the 
casuistry  of  our  English  constitution,  by  the  questions 
raised  in  his  person  as  to  the  effects  of  expulsion  from 
the  House  of  Commons,  &;c.  &c.  ;  and,  finally,  with  the 
history  of  English  jurisprudence,  by  his  intrepidity  on 
the  matter  of  general  warrants.  M.  Simond' s  party,  when 
at  length  it  arrived,  consisted  of  two  persons  besides  him- 
self, viz.  his  wife,  the  niece  of  Wilkes,  and  a  young  lady 
of  eighteen,  standing  in  the  relation  of  grand-niece  to 
the  same  memorable  person.  This  young  lady,  highly 
pleasing  in  her  person,  on  quitting  the  lake  district,  went 
northwards  with  her  party,  to  Edinburgh,  and  there 
became  acquainted  with  Mr.  Francis  Jeffrey,  the  present 
Lord  Jeffrey,  who  naturally  enough  fell  in  love  with  her, 
followed  her  across  the  Atlantic,  and  in  Charleston,  I 
believe,  received  the  honor  of  her  hand  in  marriage. 

I,  as  one  of  Mrs.  Millar's  friends,  put  in  my  claim  to 
entertain  her  American  party  in  my  turn.  One  long 
summer's  day,  they  all  came  over  to  my  cottage  in  Gras- 


SOCia/Y  or   THE  LAKES. 


501 


mere ;  and  as  it  became  my  duty  to  do  the  honors  of  our 
vale  to  the  strangers,  1  thought  that  I  could  not  discharge 
the  duty  in  a  way  more  likely  to  interest  them  all,  than 
by  conducting  them  through  to  Grasmere  into  the  little 
inner  chamber  of  Easedale  ;  and  there,  within  sight  of 
the  solitary  cottage,  Blentarn  Ghyll,  telling  them  the 
story  of  the  Greens  ;  because,  in  this  way,  I  had  an  op- 
portunity, at  the  same  time,  of  showing  the  scenery  from 
some  of  the  best  points,  and  of  opening  to  them  a  few 
glimpses  of  the  character  and  customs  which  distinguish 
this  section  of  the  English  yeomanry  from  others.  The 
story  did  certainly  interest  them  all ;  and  thus  far  I  suc- 
ceeded in  my  duties  as  Cicerone  and  Amphytrion  of  the 
day.  But  throughout  the  rest  of  our  long  morning's 
ramble,  I  remember  that  accident,  or,  possibly  the  polite- 
ness of  M.  Simond  and  his  French  sympathy  with  a 
young  man's  natural  desire  to  stand  well  in  the  eyes  of  a 
handsome  young  woman,  so  ordered  it,  that  I  had  con- 
stantly the  honor  of  being  Miss  Wilkes'  immediate  com- 
panion, as  the  narrowness  of  the  path  pretty  generally 
threw  us  into  ranks  of  two  and  two.  Having,  therefore, 
through  so  many  hours,  the  opportunity  of  an  exclusive 
conversation  with  this  young  lady,  it  would  have  been 
my  own  fault  had  I  failed  to  carry  off  an  impression  of 
her  great  good  sense,  as  well  as  her  amiable  and  spirited 
character.  Certainly  I  did  mon  possible  to  entertain  her, 
both  on  her  own  account  and  as  the  visitor  of  my  Scottish 
friends.  But,  in  the  midst  of  all  my  efforts,  I  had  the 
mortification  to  feel  that  I  was  rowing  against  the  stream ; 
that  there  was  a  silent  body  of  prepossession  against  the 
rvhole  camp  of  the  lakers,  which  nothing  could  unsettle: 
Miss  Wilkes  naturally  looked  up,  with  some  feelings  of 
respect,  to  M.  Simond,  who,  by  his  marriage  with  her 
fiunt,  had  become  her  3wn  guardian  and  protector.  Now 


502 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


M.  Simond,  of  all  the  men  in  tlie  world,  was  the  last  who 
could  have  appreciated  an  English  poet.  He  had,  to 
begin  with,  a  French  inaptitude  for  apprehending  poetry 
at  all :  any  poetry,  that  is,  which  transcends  manners  and 
the  interests  of  social  life.  Then,  unfortunately,  not 
merely  through  what  he  had  not,  but  equally  through 
what  he  had,  this  cleverish  Frenchman  was,  by  whole 
diameters  of  the  earth,  remote  from  the  station  at  which  he 
could  comprehend  Wordsworth.  He  was  a  thorough 
knowing  man  of  the  world,  keen,  sharp  as  a  razor,  and 
valuing  nothing  but  the  tangible  and  the  ponderable.  He 
had  a  smattering  of  mechanics,  of  physiology,  geology, 
mineralogy,  and  all  other  ologies  whatsoever  ;  he  had, 
besides,  at  his  fingers'  ends,  a  huge  body  of  statistical 
facts  —  how  many  people  did  live,  could  live,  ought  to 
live,  in  each  particular  district  of  each  manufacturing 
county ;  how  many  old  women  of  eighty- three  there 
ought  to  be  to  so  many  little  children  of  one ;  how  many 
murders  ought  to  be  committed  in  a  month  by  each  town 
of  five  thousand  souls  ;  and  so  on  ad  wfinitum.  And  to 
such  a  thin  shred  had  his  old  French  politeness  been  worn 
down  by  American  attrition,  that  his  thin  lips  could,  with 
much  ado,  contrive  to  disguise  his  contempt  for  those  who 
failed  to  meet  him  exactly  upon  his  own  field,  with  ex 
actly  his  own  quality  of  knowledge.  Yet,  after  all,  it  wa? 
but  a  little  case  of  knowledge,  that  he  had  packed  up 
neatly  for  a  make-shift ;  just  what  corresponds  to  the  little 
assortment  of  razors,  tooth-brushes,  nail  brushes,  hair- 
brushes, cork-screw,  gimlet,  &c.  &c.,  which  one  carries 
in  one's  trunk,  in  a  red  Morocco  case,  to  meet  the  casual- 
ties of  a  journey.  The  more  one  was  indignant  at  being 
the  object  of  such  a  man's  contempt,  the  more  heartily  did 
©ne  disdain  his  disdain,  and  recalcitrate  his  kicks. 

On  the  single  day  which  Mrs.  Millar  could  spare  for 


SOCIETY  OF  THE  LAKES. 


503 


Grasmere,  I  had  taken  care  to  ask  Wordsworth  amongst 
those  who  were  to  meet  the  party.  Wordsworth  came  ; 
out,  by  instinct,  he  and  Monsieur  Simond  knew<  and  re- 
coiled fiom  each  other.  They  met,  they  saw,  they  inter- 
despised,  Wordsworth,  on  his  side,  seemed  so  heartily 
to  despise  M.  Simond,  that  he  did  not  stir  or  make  an 
effort  to  right  himself  under  any  misapprehension  of  the 
Frenchman,  but  coolly  acquiesced  in  any  and  every  infer- 
ence which  he  might  be  pleased  to  draw ;  whilst  M. 
Simond,  double-charged  with  contempt  from  The  Edin- 
harsh  Review,  and  from  the  report  (I  cannot  doubt)  of 
his  present  hostess,  manifestly  thought  Wordsworth  too 
abject  almost  for  the  trouble  of  too  openly  disdaining  him. 
More  than  one  of  us  could  have  done  justice  on  this 
malefactor,  by  meeting  M.  Simond  on  his  own  ground,  and 
taking  the  conceit  out  of  him  most  thoroughly.  I  was  one 
of  those ;  for  I  had  the  very  knowledge,  or  some  of  it, 
that  he  most  paraded.  But  one  of  us  was  lazy ;  another 
thought  it  not  tanti ;  and  I,  for  my  part,  in  my  own  house, 
could  not  move  upon  such  a  service.  And  in  those  days, 
moreover,  when  as  yet  I  loved  Wordsworth  not  less  than  I 
venerated  him,  a  success  that  would  have  made  him  suffer 
in  any  man's  opinion  by  comparison  with  myself,  would 
have  been  painful  to  my  feelings.  Never  did  party  meet 
more  exquisitely  ill-assorted  ;  never  did  party  separate 
with  more  exquisite  and  cordial  disgust,  in  its  principal 
members  towards  each  other.  I  mention  the  case  at  all, 
in  order  to  illustrate  the  abject  condition  of  worldly 
opinion  in  which  Wordsworth  then  lived.  Perhaps  his  ill 
fame  was  just  then  in  its  meridian ;  for  M.  Simond,  soon 
after,  published  his  English  tour  in  two  octavo  volumes ; 
and,  of  course,  he  goes  over  his  residence  at  the  lakes ; 
yet  it  is  a  strong  fact  that,  according  to  my  remembrance, 


504 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


he  does  not  vouchsafe  to  mention  sucli  a  person  as  Words* 
worth. 

One  anecdote,  before  parting  with  these  ladies,  I  will 
mention,  as  received  from  Miss  Cullen  on  her  personal 
knowledge  of  the  fact.  There  are  stories  current  which 
resemble  this  ;  but  wanting  that  immediate  guarantee  for 
their  accuracy  which,  in  this  case,  I  at  least  was  obliged 
to  admit,  in  the  attestation  of  so  perfectly  veracious  a 
reporter  as  this  excellent  lady.  A  female  friend  of  hei 
own,  a  person  of  family  and  consideration,  being  on  the 
eve  of  undertaking  a  visit  to  a  remote  part  of  the  kingdom, 
dreamed  that,  on  reaching  the  end  of  her  journey,  and 
drawing  up  to  the  steps  of  the  door,  a  footman,  with  a 
very  marked  and  forbidding  expression  of  countenance, 
his  complexion  pale  and  bloodless,  and  his  manners  sullen, 
presented  himself  to  let  down  the  steps  of  her  carriage. 
This  same  man,  at  a  subsequent  point  of  her  dream,  ap- 
peared to  be  stealing  up  a  private  staircase,  with  some 
murderous  instruments  in  his  hands,  towards  a  bed-room 
door.  This  dream  was  repeated,  I  think,  twice.  Some 
time  after,  the  lady,  accompanied  by  a  grown-up  daughter, 
accomplished  her  journey.  Great  was  the  shock  which 
awaited  her  on  reaching  her  friend's  house :  a  servant, 
corresponding  in  all  points  to  the  shadowy  outline  ot 
her  dream,  equally  bloodless  in  complexion,  and  equally 
gloomy  in  manner,  appeared  at  her  carriage  door.  The 
issue  of  the  story  was  —  that  upon  a  particular  night, 
after  a  stay  of  some  length,  the  lady  grew  unaccountably 
nervous  ;  resisted  her  feelings  for  some  time  ;  but  at 
length,  at  the  entreaty  of  her  daughter,  who  slept  in  the 
same  room,  suffered  some  communication  of  the  case  to 
be  made  to  a  gentleman  resident  in  the  house,  who  had 
not  yet  retired  to  rest.  This  gentleman,  struck  by  the 
iream,  and  still  more  on  recalling  to  mind  some  suspicious 


SOCIETY  OF  THE  LAKES.  505 

preparations,  as  if  for  a  hasty  departure,  in  which  he  had 
detected  the  servant,  waited  in  concealment  until  three 
o'clock  in  the  morning  —  at  which  time  hearing  a  stealthy 
step  moving  up  the  staircase,  he  issued  with  fire-arms,  and 
met  the  man  at  the  lady's  door,  so  equipped  as  to  leave  no 
doubt  of  his  intentions  ;  which  possibly  contemplated  only 
robbing  of  the  lady's  jewels,  but  possibly  also  murder  in  a 
case  of  extremity.  There  are  other  stories  with  some  of 
the  same  circumstances  ;  and,  in  particular,  I  remember 
one  very  like  it  in  Dr.  Abercrombie's  *  Inquiries  Concern- 
ing the  Intellectual  Powers,'  [1830,1  p.  283.  But  in  this 
version  of  Dr.  Abercrombie's,  (supposing  it  another  ver- 
sion of  the  same  story,)  the  striking  circumstance  ot 
anticipating  the  servant's  features  is  omitted ;  and  in  no 
version,  except  this  of  Miss  Cullen's,  have'I  heard  the 
names  mentioned  both  of  the  parties  to  the  afiair,  and 
&lso  of  the  place  at  which  it  occunred. 


506 


LITEBABT  REMINISCENCES. 


CHAPTER  X  VIII. 

CHARLES  LLOYD. 

Immedi  A.TELY  below  the  little  village  of  Clappersgate,  ill 
which  the  Scottish  ladies  resided  —  Mrs.  Millar  and  Mrs. 
Cullen  —  runs  the  wild  mountain  river  called  the  Brathay^ 
which,  descending  from  Langdale  Head,  and  soon  after 
becoming  confluent  with  the  Rothay,  (a  brook-like  stream 
that  comes  originally  from  Easedale,  and  takes  its  course 
through  the  two  lakes  of  Grasmere  and  Rydal,)  finally 
composes  a  considerable  body  of  water,  that  flows  along, 
deep,  calm,  and  steady  —  no  longer  brawling,  bubbling, 
tumultuous  —  into  the  splendid  lake  of  Windermere,  the 
largest  of  our  English  waters ;  or,  if  not,  at  least  the 
longest,  and  of  the  most  extensive  circuit.  Close  to  this 
little  river,  Brathay,  on  the  farther  side,  as  regards  Clap- 
persgate, (and  what,  though  actually  part  and  parcel  of  a 
district  that  is  severed  by  the  sea,  or  by  Westmoreland, 
from  Lancashire  proper,  is  yet,  from  some  old  legal  usage, 
denominated  the  Lancashire  side  of  the  Brathay,)  stands 
a  modest  family  mansion,  called  Low  Brathay,  by  way  of 
distinction  from  another  and  a  larger  mansion,  about  a 
quarter  of  a  mile  beyond  it,  which,  standing  upon  a  little 
eminence,  is  called  High  Brathay, 

In  this  house  of  Low  Brathay  lived,  and  continued  to 
live,  for  many  years,  (in  fact,  until  misery,  in  its  sharpest 
form,  drove  him  from  his  hearth  and  his  household  hap- 


CHAKLES  LLOYD. 


507 


piness,)  Charles  L  ,  the  younger  ;  —  on   his  own 

Recount,  and  for  his  personal  qualities,  worthy  of  a  sepa- 
rate notice  in  any  biography,  howsoever  sparing  in  its 
digressions  ;  but,  viewed  in  reference  to  his  fortunes, 
amongst  the  most  interesting  men  I  have  known.  Never 
do  I  reflect  upon  his  hard  fate,  and  the  bitter  though 
mysterious  persecution  of  body  which  pursued  him,  dogged 
him,  and  thickened  as  life  advanced,  but  I  feel  gratitude 
to  Heaven  for  my  own  exemption  from  suffering  in  that 
particular  form  ;  and,  in  the  midst  of  afflictions,  of  which 
two  or  three  have  been  most  hard  to  bear,  because  not 
iinmingled  with  pangs  of  remorse  for  the  share  which  I 
myself  may  have  had  in  causing  them  —  still,  by  compari- 
son with  the  lot  of  Charles  L  ,  I  acknowledge  my  own 

to  have  been  happy  and  serene.    Already,  on  my  first 

hasty  visit  to  Grasmere  in  1807,  I  found  Charles  L  , 

settled  with  his  family  at  Brathay,  and  a  resident  there,  I 
believe,  of  some  standing.  It  was  on  a  wet  gloomy  even- 
ing ;  and  Miss  Wordsworth  and  I  were  returning  from  an 
excursion  to  Esthwaite  Water,  when,  suddenly,  in  the 
midst  of  blinding  rain,  without  previous  notice,  she  said 
—  Pray,  let  us  call  for  a  few  minutes  at  this  house.  A 
garden  gate  led  us  into  a  little  shrubbery,  chiefly  composed 
of  lawns,  beautifully  kept,  through  which  ran  a  gravel 
road,  just  wide  enough  to  admit  a  single  carriage.  A 
minute  or  so  saw  us  housed  in  a  small  comfortable  draw- 
ing-room, but  with  no  signs  of  living  creatures  near  it ; 
and,  from  the  accident  of  double  doors,  all  covered  with 
baize,  being  scattered  about  the  house,  the  whole  mansion 
beemed  the  palace  of  silence,  though  populous,  I  under- 
stood, with  children.    In  no  long  time  appeared  Mr. 

L  ;  soon  followed  by  his  youthful  wife,  both  radiant 

with  kindness  ;  and  it  may  be  supposed  that  we  were  not 
luffered  to  depart  for  some  hours.    I  call  Mrs.  L  • 


JOS  IiITEKARY  REMINISCENCE^, 

foutliful;  and  so  I  might  call  her  husband;  for  both 
were  youthful,  considered  as  the  parents  of  a  numerous 
family,  six  or  seven  children  then  living  —  Charles  L 
himself  not  being  certainly  more  than  twenty-seven,  and 
liis  *  Sophia '  pr  rhaps  not  twenty-five. 

On  that  short  visit  I  saw  enough  to  interest  me  in  both  ; 
and  two  years  after,  when  I  became  myself  a  permanent 
resident  in  Grasmere,  the  connection  between  us  became 
close  and  intimate.  My  cottage  stood  just  five  miles 
from  Brathay  ;  and  there  were  two  mountain  roads  which 
shortened  the  space  between  us,  though  not  the  time  nor 
the  toil.  But,  notwithstanding  this  distance,  often  and 
often,  upon  the  darkest  nights,  for  many  years,  I  used  to 
go  over  about  nine  o'clock,  or  an  hour  later,  and  sit  with 

him  till  one.    Mrs.  L  was  simply  an  amiable  young 

woman,  of  pleasing  person,  perfectly  well  principled,  and, 
as  a  wife  and  mother,  not  surpassed  by  anybody  I  have 
known  in  either  of  those  characters.  In  figure  she  some- 
what resembled  the  ever  memorable  and  most  excellent 
Mrs.  Jordan;  she  was  exactly  of  the  middle  height,  and, 
having  that  slight  degree  of  embonpoint,  even  in  youth, 
which  never  through  life  diminishes  or  increases.  Her 
complexion  may  be  imagined,  from  the  circumstances  of 
her  hair  being  tinged  with  a  slight  and  not  unpleasing 
shade  of  red.  Finally,  in  manners,  she  was  remarkably 
self-possessed,  free  from  all  awkard  embarrassment,  and 
(to  an  extent  which  some  people  would  wonder  at  in  one 
who  had  been  brought  up,  I  believe,  wholly  in  a  great 
commercial  town)  perfectly  lady-like.  So  much  descrip- 
tion is  due  to  one,  who,  though  no  authoress,  and  never 
making  the  slightest  pretension  to  talents,  was  too  much 
connected  subsequently  with  the  lakers  to  be  passed  over 
tn  a  review  of  their  community.  Ah  !  gentle  lady  !  your 
liead,  after  struggling  through  many  a  year  with  strange 


CHi^BLES  LLOYD. 


609 


calamities,  has  found  rest  at  length ;  but  not  in  English 
ground,  or  amongst  the  mountains  which  you  loved :  at 
Versailles  it  is,  and  perhaps  within  a  stone's  throw  of  that 
Mrs.  Jordan  whom  in  so  many  things  you  resembled,  and 
most  of  all  in  the  misery  which  settled  upon  your  latter 
years.  There  you  lie,  and  for  ever,  whose  blooming 
matronly  figure  rises  up  to  me  at  this  moment  from  a 
depth  of  thirty  years !  and  your  children  scattered  into  all 
lands. 

But  for  Charles  L  ,  he,  by  his  literary  works,  is  so 

far  known  to  the  public,  that,  on  his  own  account,  he 
merits  some  separate  notice.  His  poems  do  not  place 
him  in  the  class  of  powerful  poets ;  they  are  loosely 
conceived  —  faultily  even  at  times  —  and  not  finished  in 
the  execution.  But  they  have  a  real  and  a  mournful 
merit  under  one  aspect,  which  might  be  so  presented  to 
the  general  reader  as  to  win  a  peculiar  interest  for  many 
of  them,  and  for  some  a  permanent  place  in  any  judicious 
thesaurus  —  such  as  we  may  some  day  hope  to  see  drawn 
off,  and  carefully  filtered,  from  the  enormous  mass  of 
poetry  produced  since  the  awakening  era  of  the  French 
Revolution.  This  aspect  is  founded  on  the  relation  which 
they  bear  to  the  real  events  and  the  unexaggerated  afflic- 
tions of  his  own  life.  The  feelings  which  he  attempts  to 
express  were  not  assumed  for  effect  nor  drawn  by  sug- 
gestion from  others,  and  then  transplanted  into  some  ideal 
i^xperience  of  his  own.  They  do  not  belong  to  the  mimetic 
poetry  so  extensively  cultivated,  but  they  were  true  solitary 
tighs,  wrung  from  his  own  meditative  heart  by  excess  of 
suffering,  and  by  the  yearning  after  old  scenes  and  house- 
hold faces  of  an  impassioned  memory,  brooding  over 
vanished  happiness,  and  cleaving  to  those  early  times 
when  life  wore  even  for  his  eyes  the  golden  light  of 
Paradise.    But  he  had  other  and  higher  accomplishments 


510 


LITEEARY  BEMINISCENCES. 


of  intellect  than  he  showed  in  his  verses,  as  I  shall  pres- 
ently explain;  and  of  a  nature  which  make  it  difficult 
to  bring  them  adequately  within  the  reader's  apprehen- 
sion. 

Meantime,  I  will  sketch  an  outline  of  poor  L  's 

history,  so  far  as  I  can  pretend  to  know  it.  He  was  the 
son,  and  probably  his  calamitous  life  originally  dated 
from  his  being  the  son,  of  Quaker  parents.  It  was  said, 
indeed,  by  himself  as  well  as  others,  that  the  mysterious 
malady  which  haunted  him,  had  been  derived  from  an 
ancestress  in  the  maternal  line ;  and  this  may  have  been 
true ;  and,  for  all  that,  it  may  also  be  true  that  Quaker 
habits  were  originally  answerable  for  this  legacy  of  wo. 
It  is  sufficiently  well  known  that  in  the  training  of  their 
young  people,  the  Society  of  Friends  make  it  a  point  of 
conscience  to  apply  severe  checks  to  all  open  manifesta- 
tions of  natural  feeling,  or  of  exuberant  spirits.  Not  the 
passions  —  they  are  beyond  their  control  —  but  the  ex- 
pression of  those  passions  by  any  natural  language ;  this 
they  lay  under  the  heaviest  restraint ;  and,  in  many  cases, 
it  is  possible  that  such  a  system  of  thwarting  nature  may 
io  no  great  mischief;  just  as  we  see  the  American  Indians, 
m  moulding  the  plastic  skulls  of  their  infants  into  capri- 
cious shapes,  do  not,  after  all,  much  disturb  the  ordinary 
tourse  of  nature,  nor  produce  the  idiots  we  might  have 
expected.  But,  then,  the  reason  why  such  tampering  may 
often  terminate  in  slight  results  is,  because  often  there  is 
not  much  to  tamper  with  ;  the  machinery  is  so  slight,  and 
the  total  range  within  which  it  plays  is  perhaps  so  narrow, 
that  the  difference  between  its  normal  action  and  its 
widest  deviation  may,  after  all,  be  practically  unimportant. 
For  there  are  many  men  and  women  of  whom  I  have 
already  said,  borrowing  the  model  of  the  word  from 
Hartley,  that  they  have  not  so  much  passions  as  passiun- 


CHARLES  LLOYr. 


611 


cles.  These,  however,  are  in  one  extreme  ;  and  others 
there  are  and  will  be,  m  every  class,  and  under  every 
disadvantage,  who  are  destined  to  illustrate  the  very 
opposite  extreme.  Great  passions  —  passions  pointing  to 
the  paths  of  love,  of  ambition,  of  glory,  martial  or  literary 
—  these  in  men  —  and  in  women,  again,  these,  either  in 
some  direct  shape,  or  taking  the  form  of  intense  sympathy 
with  the  same  passions  as  moving  amongst  contemporary 
men  —  will  gleam  out  fitfully  amongst  the  placid  children 
of  Fox  and  Penn,  not  less  than  amongst  us  who  profess 
no  war  with  the  nobler  impulses  of  our  nature.  And, 
perhaps,  according  to  the  Grecian  doctrine  of  antiperista- 
sis,  strong  untameable  passions  are  more  likely  to  arise, 
even  in  consequence  of  the  counteraction.  Deep  passions 
undoubtedly  lie  in  the  blood  and  constitution  of  English- 
men; and  Quakers,*  after  all,  do  not,  by  being  such, 
cease,  therefore,  to  be  Englishmen. 

It  is,  I  have  said,  sufficiently  well  known  that  the 
Quakers  make  it  a  point  of  their  moral  economy  to  lay 
the  severest  restraints  upon  all  ebullitions  of  feeling. 
Whatever  may  be  the  nature  of  the  feeling,  whatever  its 
strength,  utter  itself  by  word  or  by  gesture  it  must  not ; 
smoulder  it  may,  but  it  must  not  break  into  a  flame.  This 
is  known  ;  but  it  is  not  equally  known  that  this  unnatural 
restraint,  falling  into  collision  with  two  forces  at  once,  the 

*  In  using  the  term  Quakers,  I  hoped  it  would  have  been  under- 
stood, even  without  any  explanation  from  myself,  that  I  did  not  mean 
to  use  it  scornfully  or  insultingly  to  that  respectable  body.  But  it 
was  the  great  oversight  of  their  founders  not  to  have  saved  them 
from  a  nickname,  by  assuming  some  formal  designation  expressive 
of  some  capital  characteristic.  At  present  one  is  in  this  dilemma; 
either  one  must  use  a  tedious  periphrasis,  (e.  the  young  woiiien  of 
ike  Society  of  Friends  y)  or  the  ambiguous  one  of  young  female 
f*riends. 


512 


LITERARf  REMINISCENCES. 


force  of  passion  and  of  youth,  not  uncommonly  records 
its  own  injurious  tendencies,  and  publishes  the  rebellious 
movements  of  nature,  by  distinct  and  anomalous  diseases. 
And  further,  I  have  been  assured,  upon  most  excellent 
authority,  that  these  diseases,  strange  and  elaborate  affec- 
tions of  the  nervous  system,  are  found  exclusively  amongst 
the  young  men  and  women  of  the  Quaker  society  ;  that 
they  are  known  and  understood  exclusively  amongst 
physicians  who  have  practised  in  great  towns  having  a 
large  Quaker  population,  such  as  Birmingham ;  that  they 
assume  a  new  type,  and  a  more  inveterate  character,  in  the 
second  or  third  generation,  to  whom  this  fatal  inheritance 
is  often  transmitted  ;  and  finally,  that,  if  this  class  of  ner- 
vous derangements  does  not  increase  so  much  as  to  attract 
public  attention,  it  is  simply  because  the  community  itself 
—  the  Quaker  body  —  does  not  increase,  but,  on  the  con- 
trary, is  rather  on  the  wane. 

From  a  progenitrix,  then,  no  matter  in  what  generation, 

C.  L  inherited  that  awful  malady  which  withered  his 

own  happiness,  root  and  branch,  gathering  strength  from 
year  to  year.  His  father  was  a  banker,  and,  I  presume, 
wealthy,  from  the  ample  allowance  which  he  always  made 
to  his  son  Charles.  Charles,  it  is  true,  had  the  rights  of 
primogeniture  — -  which,  however,  in  a  commercial  family, 
.ire  not  considerable  —  but,  at  the  same  time,  though  eldest, 
he  was  eldest  of  seventeen  or  eighteen  brothers  and  sisters, 
and  of  these,  I  believe,  that  some  round  dozen  or  so  were 
living  at  the  time  when  I  first  came  to  know  him.  He  had 
been  educated  in  the  bosom  of  Quaker  society  ;  his  own 
parents,  with  most  of  their  friends,  were  Quakers  ;  and, 
even  of  his  own  generation,  all  the  young  women  con- 
tinued Quakers.  Naturally,  therefore,  as  a  boy,  he  also 
was  obliged  to  conform  to  the  Quaker  ritual.  But  this 
tibial  presses  with  great  inequality  upon  the  two  sexes  • 


CHARLES  LLOYD. 


513 


in  so  far,  at  least,  as  regards  dress.  The  distinctions  of 
dress  which  announce  the  female  Quaker,  are  all  in  hex 
favor.  In  a  nation  eminent  for  personal  purity,  and  where 
it  should  seem  beforehand  impossible  for  any  woman  to 
create  a  pre-eminence  for  herself  in  that  respect ;  so  it  is, 
however,  that  the  female  Quaker,  by  her  dress,  seems 
even  purer  than  other  women,  and  consecrated  to  a  ser- 
vice of  purity  ;  earthly  soil  or  taint,  even  the  sullying 
breath  of  mortality,  seems  as  if  kept  aloof  from  her  per- 
son —  forcibly  held  in  repulsion  by  some  protecting  sanc- 
tity. This  transcendent  purity,  and  a  nun-like  gentleness, 
self-respect,  and  sequestration  from  the  world  —  these  are 
all  that  her  peculiarity  of  dress  expresses  ;  and  surely  this 
*  all '  is  quite  enough  to  win  every  man's  favorable  feel- 
ings towards  her,  and  something  even  like  homage.  But, 
with  the  male  Quaker,  how  different  is  the  case  !  His 
dress  —  originally  not  remarkable  by  its  shape,  but  solely 
by  its  color  and  want  of  ornament,  so  peculiar  has  it  be- 
come in  a  lapse  of  nearly  two  centuries  —  seems  expressly 
devised  to  point  him  out  to  ridicule.  In  some  towns,  it  is 
true,  such  as  Birmingham  and  Kendal,  the  public  eye  is 
so  familiar  with  this  costume,  that  in  them  it  excites  no 
feeling  whatever  more  than  the  professional  costume  of 
butchers,  bakers,  grooms,  &c.  But  in  towns  not  com- 
mercial —  towns  of  luxury  and  parade  —  a  Quaker  is  ex- 
posed to  most  mortifying  trials  of  his  self-esteem.  It  has 
happened  that  I  have  followed  a  young  man  of  this  order 
for  a  quarter  of  a  mile,  in  Bath,  or  in  one  of  the  fashiona- 
ble streets  of  London,  on  a  summer  evening,  when  numer- 
lus  servants  were  lounging  on  the  steps  of  the  front  door, 
or  at  the  area  gates  ;  and  I  have  seen  him  run  the  gaunt- 
let of  grim  smiles  from  the  men,  and  heard  him  run  the 
gauntlet  of  that  sound  —  the  worst  which  heaven  has  in 
*ts  artillery  of  scorn  against  the  peace  of  poor  man  —  tha 
83 


514 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCE8. 


half-suppressed  titter  of  the  women.  Laughing  outright 
is  bad,  but  still  that  may  be  construed  into  a  determinate 
insult  that  studiously  avows  more  contempt  than  is  really 
felt ;  but  tittering  is  hell  itself;  for  it  seems  mere  nature, 
and  absolute  truth,  that  extort  this  expression  of  contempt 
in  spite  of  every  effort  to  suppress  it. 

Some  such  expression  it  was  that  drove  Charles  L  

into  an  early  apostacy  from  his  sect :  early  it  must  have 
been,  for  he  went  at  the  usual  age  of  eighteen  to  Cam- 
bridge, and  there,  as  a  Quaker,  he  could  not  have  been 
received.  He,  indeed,  of  all  men,  was  the  least  fitted  to 
contend  with  the  world's  scorn,  for  he  had  no  great  forti- 
tude of  mind,  his  vocation  was  not  to  martyrdom,  and  he 
was  cursed  with  the  most  exquisite  sensibility.  This  sen- 
sibility, indeed,  it  was,  and  not  so  properly  any  determinate 
passion,  which  had  been  the  scourge  of  his  ancestors. 
There  was  something  that  appeared  effeminate  about  it ; 
and  which,  accordingly,  used  to  provoke  the  ridicule  of 
Wordsworth,  whose  character,  in  all  its  features,  wore  a 
masculine  and  Roman  harshness.    But,  in  fact,  when  you 

came  to  know  Charles  L  ,  there  was,  even  in  this 

slight  tinge  of  effeminacy,  something  which  conciliated 
your  pity  by  the  feeling  that  it  impressed  you  with,  of 
being  part  of  his  disease.  His  sensibility  was  eminently 
Rousseauish  —  that  is,  it  was  physico-moral ;  now  pointing 
to  appetites  that  would  have  mastered  him  had  he  been 
less  intellectual,  and  governed  by  a  less  exalted  standard 
of  moral  perceptions ;  now  pointing  to  fine  aerial  specu- 
lations, subtle  as  a  gossamer,  and  apparently  calculated  to 
ead  him  off  into  abstractions  even  too  remote  from  flesh 
and  blood. 

During  the  Cambridge  vacation,  or,  it  might  be,  even 
before  he  went  to  Cambridge  —  and  my  reason  for  think- 
ing 80  is,  because  both,  I  believed,  belonged  to  the  samt 


CHARLES  LLOYD 


515 


town,  if  it  could  not  be  said  of  them  as  of  Pj^ramus  and 
Thisbe,  that  '  contiguas  hahuere  domos '  —  he  fell  despe- 
rately in  love  with  Miss  Sophia  P  n.    Who  she  was  T 

never  heard  —  that  is,  what  were  her  connections  ;  but,  I 
presume,  that  she  must  have  been  of  an  opulent  family, 
because,  Mrs.  P  n,  the  mother  of  Mrs.  L  ,  occa- 
sionally paid  a  visit  to  her  daughter  at  the  lakes  ;  and  that 
she  brought  with  her  a  hand.^'^mely-appointed  equipage, 
as  to  horses  and  servants.  This  I  have  reason  to  remem- 
ber from  the  fact  of  herself  and  her  daughter  frequently 
coming  over  on  summer  evenings  to  drink  tea  with  me, 
and  the  affront  (as  I  then  thought  it)  which  Wordsworth 
fastened  upon  me  in  connection  with  one  of  those  visits. 
One  evening,       ♦       *       ^       «  * 

A  pang  of  wrath  gathered  at  my  heart.  Yet  why  ? 
One  moment,  I  felt,  indeed,  that  it  was  not  gentlemanly  to 
interfere  with  the  privileges  of  any  man  standing  in  the 
situation  which  I  then  occupied,  of  host ;  but  still  I  should 
not  have  regarded  it,  except  from  its  connection  with  a 
case  I  recollected  in  a  previous  year.  One  fine  summer 
day,  we  were  walking  together  —  Wordsworth,  myself, 
and  Southey.    Southey  had  been  making  earnest  inquiries 

about  poor  L  ,  just  then  in  the  crisis  of  some  severe 

illness,  and  Wordsworth's  answer  had  been  partly  lost  to 
me.  I  put  a  question  upon  it,  when,  to  my  surprise,  (my 
wrath  internally,  but  also  to  my  special  amusement,)  he 
replied  that,  in  fact,  what  he  had  said  was  a  matter  of 
some  delicacy,  and  not  quite  proper  to  be  communicated 
except  to  near  friends  of  the  family.  This  to  me  !  —  O 
ye  Gods! — to  me,  who  knew  by  many  a  hundred  con- 
versations, how  disagreeable  Wordsworth  was,  both  to 

Charles  L  and  to  his  wife  ;  whilst,  on  the  other  hand 

—  not  by  words  only,  but  by  deeds,  and  by  the  most  deli- 
cto acts  of  confidential  favor  —  I  knew  that  Mr.  Wilson 


516 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


(Professor  "Wilson)  and  myself  had  been  selected  as  friendfc 
in  cases  which  were  not  so  much  as  named  to  Wordsworth, 
The  arrogance  of  Wordsworth  was  well  illustrated  in  this 

Case  of  the  L  s. 

But  to  resume  L  's  history.    Being  so  desperately 

in  love  with  Miss  P  n,  and  his  parents  being  rich,  why 

should  he  not  have  married  her  ?  Why,  I  know  not.  But 
some  great  obstacles  arose  ;  and,  I  presume,  on  the  side 
of  Miss  P  n's  friends  ;  for,  actually,  it  became  neces- 
sary to  steal  her  away  ;  and  the  person  in  whom  L  

confided  for  this  delicate  service,  was  no  other  than 
Southey.  A  better  choice  he  could  not  have  made.  Had 
the  lady  been  Helen  of  Greece,  Southey  would  not  have 
had  a  thought  but  for  the  honor  and  interests  of  his  con- 
fiding friend. 

Having  thus,  by  proxy,  run  away  with  his  yoimg  wife, 

and  married  her,  L  brought  her  to  Cambridge.    It  is 

a  novel  thing  in  Cambridge,  though  not  altogether  unpre- 
cedented, for  a  student  to  live  there  with  a  wife.  This 

novelty  L  exhibited  to  the  University  for  some  time ; 

but  then,  finding  the  situation  not  perfectly  agreeable  to 
the  delicate  sensibilities  of  his  young  wife,  L-   re- 
moved, first,  I  think,  to  Penrith  ;  and,  after  some  changes, 
he  settled  down  at  Brathay,  from  which,  so  long  as  he 
stayed  on  English  ground  —  that  is,  for  about  fifteen  or 
sixteen  years  —  he  never  moved.  When  I  first  crossed 
his  path  at  the  lakes,  he  was  in  the  zenith  of  the  brief 
Viappiness  that  was  granted  to  him  on  earth.  He  stood  in 
the  very  centre  of  earthly  pleasures  ;  and,  that  his  advan- 
tages may  be  easily  estimated,  I  will  describe  both  himself 
and  his  situation. 

First,  then,  as  to  his  person,  he  was  tall  and  somewhat 
clumsy  —  not  intellectual  so  much  as  benign  and  concilia- 
cry  in  his  expression  of  face.    Hip  features  wei-e  not 


CHABLES  LLOYD. 


517 


striking,  but  they  expressed  great  goodness  of  heart ;  and 
latterly  wore  a  deprecatory  expression  that  was  peculiarly 
touching  to  those  who  knew  its  cause.  His  manners  were 
free  from  all  modes  of  vulgarity  ;  and,  where  he  acquired 
his  knowledge  I  know  not,  (for  I  never  heard  him  claim 
any  connection  with  people  of  rank,)  but  a  knowledge  he 
certainly  had  of  all  the  conventional  usages  amongst  the 
higher  circles,  and  of  those  purely  arbitrary  customs 
which  mere  good  sense  and  native  elegance  of  manner 
are  not,  of  themselves,  sufficient  to  teach.  Some  of  these 
he  might  have  learned  from  the  family  of  the  Bishop  of 
Llandaff ;  for  with  the  ladies  of  that  family  he  was  inti- 
mate, especially  with  the  eldest  daughter,  who  was  an 
accomplished  student  in  that  very  department  of  literature 

which  L  himself  most  cultivated,  viz.  all  that  class 

of  works  which  deal  in  the  analysis  of  human  passions^ 
or  attempt  to  exhibit  the  development  of  human  charac- 
ter, in  relation  to  sexual  attachments,  when  placed  in 

trying  circumstances.     L          corresponded  with  Miss 

Watson  in  French  ;  the  letters,  on  both  sides,  being  full 
of  spirit  and  originality  ;  the  subjects  generally  drawn 
from  Rousseau's  '  Heloise '  or  his  '  Confessions,'  from 
*  Corinne,'  from  '  Delphine,'  or  some  other  work  of  Ma- 
dame de  Stael.    For  such  disquisitions  L  had  a  real 

Lnd  a  powerful  genius.  It  was  really  a  delightful  luxury 
to  hear  him  giving  free  scope  to  his  powers  for  investi- 
gating subtle  combinations  of  character  ;  for  distinguish- 
ing all  the  shades  and  affinities  of  some  presiding  qualities, 
disentangling  their  intricacies,  and  balancing,  antitheti- 
cally, one  combination  of  qualities  against  another.  Take, 
for  instance,  any  well-known  character  from  the  drama, 

and  pique  L  's  delicate  perception  of  differences  by 

iffecting  to  think  it  identical  with  some  other  character 
rf  the  same  class  —  instantly,  in  his  anxiety  to  mark  out 


518 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


the  features  of  dissimilitude,  he  would  hurry  into  an  im» 
promptu  analysis  of  each  character  separately,  with  an 
eloquence,  with  a  keenness  of  distinction,  and  a  felicity  of 
phrase,  which  were  perfectly  admirable.  This  display  of 
familiarity  with  life  and  human  nature,  in  all  its  masquer- 
adings,  was  sometimes  truly  splendid.  But  two  things 
were  remarkable  in  these  displays.  One  was,  that  the 
splendor  was  quite  hidden  from  himself,  and  unperceived 
amidst  the  effort  of  mind,  and  oftentimes  severe  struggles, 
in  attempting  to  do  himself  justice,  both  as  respected  the 
thoughts  and  the  difficult  task  of  clothing  them  in  ade- 
quate words  ;  he  was  as  free  from  vanity,  or  even  from 
complacency  in  reviewing  what  he  had  effected,  as  it  is 
possible  for  a  human  creature  to  be.  He  thought,  indeed, 
slightly  of  his  own  power  ;  and,  which  was  even  a  stronger 
barrier  against  vanity,  his  displays  of  this  kind  were  always 
effective  in  proportion  to  his  unhappiness  ;  for  unhappiness 
it  was,  and  the  restlessness  of  internal  irritation,  that  chiefly 
drove  him  to  exertions  of  his  intellect ;  else,  and  when  free 
from  this  iort  of  excitement,  he  tended  to  the  quiescent 
state  of  a  i\st3ner  ;  for  he  thought  everybody  better  than 
himself.  Tht  other  point  remarkable  in  these  displays 
was,  (and  mott  unfavorable,  of  course,  it  proved  to  his 
obtaining  the  reputation  they  merited,)  that  he  could  suc- 
"•eed  in  them  oh.ly  before  confidential  friends,  those  on 
whom  he  could  i^dy  for  harboring  no  shade  of  ridicule 
towards  himself  oi  his  theme.  Let  but  one  person  enter 
the  room  of  whose  sympathy  he  did  not  feel  secure,  and 
his  powers  forsook  li.'m  as  suddenly  as  the  buoyancy  of  a 
bird  that  has  received  a  mortal  shot  in  its  wing.  Accord- 
ingly, it  is  a  fact  thai  uoither  Wordsworth  nor  Coleridge 
ever  suspected  the  amouci*  of  power  which  was  latent  in 

L  ;  for  he  firmly  beli  *ved  that  both  of  them  despised 

iim.    Mrs.  L          thought  the  same  thing.    Often  and 


CHAKLES  LLOTT> 


519 


often  she  has  said  to  me,  smiling  in  a  mournful  way  — « 
*  I  know  too  well  that  both  Wordsworth  and  Coleridge 
entertain  a  profound  contempt  for  my  poor  Charles,' 
And,  when  I  combated  this  notion,  declaring  that,  although 
they  might  (and  probably  did)  hold  very  cheap  such 
writers  as  Rousseau  and  Madame  de  Stael,  and,  conse- 
quently, could  not  approve  of  studies  directed  so  exclu- 
Bively  to  their  works,  or  to  works  of  the  same  class,  still 
that  was  not  sufficient  to  warrant  them  in  undervaluing 

the  powers  which  Mr.  L  applied  to  such  studies.  To 

this,  or  similar  arguments,  she  would  reply  by  simply 
shaking  her  head,  and  then  sink  into  silence. 

But  the  time  was  fast  approaching,  when  all  pains  of 
this  kind,  from  supercilious  or  well-founded  disparagement, 
were  to  be  swallowed  up  in  more  awful  considerations 
and  fears.    The  transition  was  not  a  long  one,  from  the 

state  of  prosperity  in  which  I  found  L  about  1807-  10, 

to  the  utter  overthrow  of  his  happiness,  and,  for  his 
friends,  the  overthrow  of  all  hopes  on  his  behalf.  In  the 
three  years  I  have  assigned,  his  situation  seemed  luxu- 
riously happy,  as  regarded  the  external  elements  of 
happiness.  He  had,  without  effort  of  his  own,  an  income, 
must  punctually  remitted  from  his  father,  of  from  £1500 
to  £1800  per  annum.  This  income  was  entirely  resigned 
to  the  management  of  his  prudent  and  excellent  wife  , 
and,  as  his  own  personal  expenses,  separate  from  those  of 
his  family,  were  absolutely  none  at  all,  except  for  books, 
she  applied  the  whole,  either  to  the  education  of  hei 
children,  or  to  the  accumulation  of  all  such  elegances  of 
life  about  their  easy  unpretending  mansion,  as  might 
soothe  her  husband's  nervous  irritations,  or  might  cheer 
Vis  drooping  spirits,  with  as  much  variety  of  pleasure  as  a 
aiountainous  seclusion  allowed.  The  establishment  of 
•ervants  was  usually  limited  to  six  —  one  only  being  a 


620 


LITEBART  EEMINISCENCBS. 


man-servant  —  but  these  were  well  chosen :  and  one  oi 
two  were  confidential  servants,  tried  by  long  experience. 
Rents  are  always  low  in  the  country  for  unfurnished 
houses  ;  and  even  for  the  country,  Low  Brathay  was  a 
cheap  house  ;  but  it  contained  everything  for  comfort, 
nothing  at  all  for  splendor.  Consequently,  a  very  large 
part  of  their  income  was  disposable  for  purposes  of  hos- 
pitality ;  and,  when  I  first  knew  them.  Low  Brathay  was 
distinguished  above  every  other  house  at  the  head  of 
Windermere,  or  within  ten  miles  of  that  neighborhood,  by 
the  judicious  assortment  of  its  dinner  parties,  and  the 
gayety  of  its   soirees   dansantes.    These   parties  were 

never  crowded;  poor  L  rarely  danced  himself;  but 

it  gladdened  his  benevolent  heart  to  see  the  young  and 
blooming  floating  through  the  mazes  of  the  dances  then 
fashionable,  whilst  he  sat  by  looking  on,  at  times,  with 
pleasure  from  his  sj^mpathy  with  the  pleasure  of  other? ; 
at  times  pursuing  some  animated  discussion  with  a  literary 
friend  ;  at  times  lapsing  into  profound  reverie.  At  some 
of  these  dances  it  was  that  I  first  saw  Wilson  of  EUeray, 
(Professor  Wilson,)  in  circumstances  of  animation,  and 
buoyant  with  youthful  spirits,  under  the  excitement  of 
lights,  wine,  and,  above  all,  of  female  company.  He,  by 
the  way,  was  the  best  male  dancer  (not  professional)  I 
have  ever  seen  ;  and  this  advantage  he  owed  entirely  to  the 
extraordinary  strength  of  his  foot  in  all  its  parts,  to  its  pecu- 
liarly happy  conformation,  and  to  the  accuracy  of  his  ear  ; 
for,  as  to  instruction,  I  have  often  understood  from  his  fam- 
ily that  he  never  had  any.    Here  also  danced  the  future 

mfe  of  Professor  Wilson,  Miss  Jane  P  ,  at  that  time 

the  leading  belle  of  the  Lake  country.  But,  perhaps,  the 
most  interesting  person  in  those  parties,  from  the  peculiar- 
ity of  her  situation,  was  Mrs.  L          herself,  still  young. 

tnd,  indeed,  not  apparently  exceeding  in  years  most  of 


CHABLES  LLOYD. 


S21 


lier  unmarried  visitors ;  still  dancing  and  moving  through 
cotillons,  or  country  dances,  as  elegantly  and  as  lightly 
as  the  youngest  of  the  company  ;  still  framing  her  coun- 
tenance to  that  expression  of  cheerfulness  which  hospitality 
required;  but  stealing  for  ever  troubled  glances  to  the 
Bofa,  or  the  recess,  v^here  her  husband  had  reclined 
himself,  dark,  foreboding  looks,  that  saw  but  too  truly 
the  coming  darkness  which  was  soon  to  swallow  up  every 
vestige  of  this  festal  pleasure.  She  looked  upon  herself 
and  her  children  too  clearly  as  a  doomed  household  ;  and 
such,  in  some  sense,  they  were.    And,  doubtless,  to  poor 

L  himself,  it  must  a  thousandfold  have  aggravated 

his  sufferings  —  that  he  could  trace,  with  a  steady  eye,  the 
continual  growth  of  that  hideous  malady  which  was 
stealing  over  the  else  untroubled  azure  of  his  life,  and 
with  inaudible  foot  was  hastening  onwards  for  ever  to  that 
night  in  which  no  man  can  work,  and  in  which  no  man 
can  hope. 

It  was  so  painful  to  Charles  L  ,  naturally,  to  talk 

much  about  his  bodily  sufferings,  and  it  would  evidently 
have  been  so  unfeeling  in  one  who  had  no  medical  coun- 
sels to  offer,  if,  for  the  mere  gratification  of  his  curiosity, 
he  had  asked  for  any  circumstantial  account  of  itb  nature  or 
symptoms,  that  I  am  at  this  moment  almost  as  much  at  a 
loss  to  understand  what  was  the  mode  of  suffering  which 
it  produced,  how  it  operated,  and  through  what  organs,  as 
any  of  my  readers  can  be.  All  that  I  know  is  this  :  —  For 
several  years  —  six  or  seven,  suppose  —  the  disease  ex- 
pressed itself  by  intense  anguish  of  irritation  ;  not  an 
irritation  that  gnawed  at  any  one  local  spot,  but  diffused 
'tself;  sometimes  causing  a  determination  of  blood  to  the 
head,  then  shaping  itsolf  in  a  general  sense  of  plethoric 
congestion  in  the  blood-vessels,  then  again  remoulding 
'^elf  into  a  restlessness    that   became  insupportable ; 


522 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


preying  upon  the  spirits  and  the  fortitude,  and  finding  no 
permanent  relief  or  periodic  interval  of  rest,  night  or  day 
Sometimes  L   used  robust  exercise,  riding  on  horse- 
back as  fast  as  he  could  urge  the  horse  forward  ;  some- 
times, for  many  weeks  together,  he  walked  for  twenty 
miles,  or  even  more,  at  a  time ;  sometimes  (this  was  in 
the  earlier  stages  of  the  case)  he  took  large  doses  of  ether  ; 
sometimes  he  used  opium,  and,  I  believe,  in  very  large 
quantities  ;  and  I  understood  him  to  say  that,  for  a  time, 
it  subdued  the  excess  of  irritability,  and  the  agonizing 
accumulation  of  spasmodic  strength  which  he  felt  for  evei 
growing  upon  him,  and,  as  it  were,  upon  the  very  surface 
of  his  whole  body.  But  all  remedies  availed  him  nothing  ; 
and  once  he  said  to  me,  when  we  were  out  upon  the  hills 
—  '  Ay,  that  landscape  below,  with  its  quiet  cottage,  looks 
lovely,  I  dare  say,  to  you  :  as  for  me,  I  see  it,  but  I  feel  it 
not  at  all ;  for,  if  I  begin  to  think  of  the  happiness,  and 
its  various  modes  which,  no  doubt,  belong  to  the  various 
occupants,  according  to  their  ages  and  hc^es,  then  I  could 
begin  to  feel  it ;  but  it  would  be  a  painful  effort  to  me  ; 
and  the  worst  of  all  would  be,  when  /  had  felt  it ;  for 
that  would  so  sharpen  the  prospect  before  me,  that  just 
such  happiness,  which  naturally  ought  to  be  mine,  is  soon 
on  the  point  of  slipping  away  from  me  for  ever.' 

Afterwards  he  told  me  that  his  situation  internally  was> 
always  this  —  it  seemed  to  him  as  if  on  some  distant  road 
he  heard  a  dull  trampling  sound,  and  that  he  knew  it,  by 
a  irvisgiving,  to  be  the  sound  of  some  man,  or  party  of 
men,  continually  advancing  slowly,  continually  threaten- 
ing, or  continually  accusing  him  ;  that  all  the  various 
artifices  which  he  practised  for  cheating  himself  into 
comfort,  or  beguiling  his  sad  forebodings,  were,  in  fact, 
but  like  so  many  furious  attempts,  by  drum  and  trumpets, 
or  even  by  artillery,  to  drown  the  distant  noise  of  his 


CHABLES  LLOYD. 


528 


enemies ;  that,  every  now  and  then,  mere  curiosity,  or 
rather  breathless  anxiety,  caused  him  to  hush  the  artificial 
iin,  and  to  put  himself  into  the  attitude  of  listening  again  ; 
when,  again  and  again,  and  so  he  was  sure  it  would  still 
be,  he  caught  the  sullen  and  accursed  sound,  trampling 
and  voices  of  men,  or  whatever  it  were,  still  steadily 
advancing,  though  still  perhaps  at  a  great  distance.  It 
was  too  evident  that  derangement  of  the  intellect,  in  some 
shape,  was  coming  on ;  because  slight  and  transient  fits  oi 
aberration  from  his  perfect  mind,  had  already,  at  intervals, 
overtaken  him ;  flying  showers,  from  the  skirts  of  the 
clouds,  that  precede  and  announce  the  main  storm.  This 
was  the  anguish  of  his  situation,  that,  for  years,  he  saw 
before  him  what  was  on  the  road  to  overwhelm  his 
faculties  a^id  his  happiness.  Still  his  fortitude  did  not 
wholly  forsake  him,  and,  in  fact,  proved  to  be  far  greater 
than  I  or  others  had  given  him  credit  for  possessing.  Once 
only  he  burst  suddenly  into  tears,  on  hearing  the  innocent 
voices  of  his  own  children  laughing,  and  of  one  especially 
who  was  a  favorite  ;  and  he  told  me  that  sometimes,  when 
this  little  child  took  his  hand  and  led  him  passively  about 
the  garden,  he  had  a  feeling  that  prompted  him  (howevei 
weak  and  foolish  it  seemed)  to  call  upon  this  child  foi 
protection  ;  and  that  it  seemed  to  him  as  if  he  might  still 
escape,  could  he  but  surround  himself  only  with  children. 
No  doubt  this  feeling  arose  out  of  his  sense  that  a  confu- 
sion was  stealing  over  his  thoughts,  and  that  men  would 
soon  find  this  out  to  be  madness,  and  would  deal  with  him 
accordingly  ;  whereas  children,  as  long  as  he  did  them  no 
Varm,  would  see  no  reason  for  shutting  him  up  from  his 
Dwn  fireside,  and  from  the  human  face  divine. 

It  would  be  too  painful  to  pursue  the  unhappy  case 
through  all  its  stages.  For  a  long  time,  the  derangement 
of  poor  L  's  mind  was  but  partial  and  fluctuatmg ; 


524 


LITEHARY  BEMINISCENCES. 


and  it  was  the  opinion  of  Professor  Wilson,  from  what  he 
had  observed,  that  it  was  possible  to  recall  him  to  himself 
jy  firmly  opposing  his  delusions.  He  certainly,  on  his 
own  part,  did  whatever  he  could  to  wean  his  thoughts 
from  gloomy  contemplation,  by  pre -occupying  them  with 
cheerful  studies,  and  such  as  might  call  out  his  faculties. 
He  translated  the  whole  of  Alfieri's  dramas,  and  publish- 
ed his  translation.  He  wrote  and  printed  (but  did  not 
publish)  a  novel  in  two  volumes  ;  my  copy  of  which  he 
soon  after  begged  back  again  so  beseechingly,  that  I 
yielded  ;  and  so,  I  believe,  did  all  his  other  friends  :  in 
which  case  no  copy  may  now  exist.  All,  however, 
availed  him  not ;  the  crisis  so  long  dreaded  arrived.  He 
was  taken  away  to  a  lunatic  aslyum  ;  and,  for  some  long 
time,  he  was  lost  to  me  as  to  the  rest  of  the  world.  The 
first  memorial  I  had  of  him,  was  a  gentleman,  with  his 
hair  in  disorder,  rushing  into  my  cottage  at  Grasmere, 
throwing  his  arms  about  my  neck,  and  bursting  into  stormy 

weeping  —  it  was  poor  L  ! 

Yes,  it  was  indeed  poor  L  ,  a  fugitive  from  a  mad- 
house, and  throwing  himself  for  security  upon  the  honor 
and  afi'ection  of  one  whom,  with  good  reason,  he  supposed 
confidentially  attached  to  him.  Could  there  be  a  situation 
BO  full  of  interest  or  perplexity  ?  Should  any  ill  happen 
to  himself,  or  to  another,  through  his  present  enlargement 
—  should  he  take  any  fit  of  vindictive  malice  against  any 
person  whom  he  might  view  as  an  accomplice  in  the  plans 
against  his  own  freedom,  and  probably  many  persons  in 
the  neighborhood,  medical  and  non-medical,  stood  liable 
to  such  a  suspicion  —  upon  me,  I  felt  as  the  abettor  of 
his  evasion,  would  all  the  blame  settle.  And  unfortu- 
nately we  had,  in  the  recent  records  of  this  very  vale,  a 
most  awful  lesson,  and  still  fresh  in  everybody's  remem- 
brance, of  the  danger  connected  with  this  sort  of  crimina. 


CHARLES  LLOYD. 


525 


connhance,  or  passive  participation  in  the  purposes  of 
maniacal  malignity.  A  man,  named  Watson,  had  often 
and  for  years  threatened  to  kill  his  aged  and  inoffensive 
mother.  His  threats,  partly  from  their  own  monstrosity, 
and  from  the  habit  of  hearing  him  for  years  repeating 
them  without  any  serious  attempt  to  give  them  effect  — 
partly  also  from  an  unwillingness  to  aggravate  the  suffer- 
ing of  the  poor  lunatic,  by  translating  him  out  of  a 
mountaineer's  liberty,  into  the  gloomy  confinement  of  an 
hospital  —  were  treated  with  neglect ;  and  at  length,  after 
years  of  disregarded  tnenace,  and  direct  forew^arning  to 
the  parish  authorities,  he  took  an  opportunity  (which 
indeed  ^vas  rarely  wanting  to  him)  of  killing  the  poor 
gray-headed  woman,  by  her  own  fireside.  This  case  I 
had  before  my  mind ;  and  it  was  the  more  entitled  to 
have  weight  with  me  when  connected  with  the  altered 

temper  of  L  ,  who  now,  for  the  first  time  in  his  life, 

had  dropped  his  gentle  and  remarkably  quiet  demeanor, 
for  a  tone,  savage  and  ferocious,  towards  more  than  one 
individual.  This  tone,  however  lurked  under  a  mask, 
and  did  not  come  forward,  except  by  fits  and  starts,  for 
the  present.  Indeed  his  whole  manner  wore  the  appear- 
ance of  studied  dissimulation,  from  the  moment  when  he 
perceived  that  I  was  not  alone.  In  the  interval  of  years 
since  I  had  last  seen  him,  (which  might  have  been  in 
1818,)  my  own  marriage  had  taken  place  ;  accordingly, 
on  turning  round  and  seeing  a  young  woman  seated  at  the 
tea-table,  where  heretofore  he  had  been  so  sure  of  finding 
me  alone,  he  seemed  shocked  at  the  depth  of  emotion 
which  he  had  betrayed  before  a  stranger,  and  anxious  to 
reinstate  himself  in  his  own  self-respect,  by  assuming  a 
tone  of  carelessness  and  indifference.  No  person  in  the 
world  could  feel  more  profoundly  on  his  account  than  the 
rcung  stranger  before  him,  who  in  fact  was  not  a  stranger 


526 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


to  his  situation  and  the  excess  of  his  misery.  But  this  ho 
could  not  know  ;  and  it  was  not,  therefore,  until  we  found 
ourselves  alone,  that  he  could  he  prevailed  upon  to  speak 
of  himself,  or  of  the  awful  circumstances  surrounding  him, 
unless  in  terms  of  most  unsuitable  levity. 

One  thing  I  resolved,  at  any  rate,  to  make  the  rule  of  my 
conduct  towards  this  unhappy  friend,  viz.  to  deal  frankly 
with  him,  and  in  no  case  to  make  myself  a  party  to  any 
plot  upon  his  personal  freedom.  Retaken  I  knew  he  would 
be,  but  not  through  me  ;  even  a  murderer  in  such  a  case, 
(t.  e,  the  case  of  having  thrown  himself  upon  my  good 
faith,)  I  would  not  betray.  I  drew  from  him  an  account 
of  the  immediate  facts  in  his  late  escape,  and  his  own  ac- 
knowledgment that  even  now  the  pursuit  must  be  close  at 
hand  ;  probably,  that  his  recap  tors  were  within  a  few  hours' 
distance  of  Grasmere ;  that  he  would  be  easily  traced. 
That  my  cottage  furnished  no  means  of  concealment,  he 
knew  too  well ;  still  in  these  respects  he  was  not  worse  oflf 
in  Grasmere  than  elsewhere;  and,  at  any  rate,  it  might 
save  him  from  immediate  renewal  of  his  agitation,  and 
might  procure  for  him  one  night  of  luxurious  rest  and 
relaxation,  by  means  of  conversation  with  a  friend,  if  he 
would  make  up  his  mind  to  stay  with  us  until  his  pursuers 
should  appear  ;  and  them  I  could  easily  contrive  to  delay, 
for  at  least  one  day  and  night,  by  throwing  false  informa- 
tion in  their  way,  such  as  would  send  them  on  to  Keswick 
at  least,  if  not  to  Whitehaven,  through  the  collusion  of  the 
very  few  persons  who  could  have  seen  him  enter  my  door. 
My  plan  was  simple  and  feasible :  but  somehow  or  ether, 
and,  I  believe,  chiefly  because  he  did  not  find  me  alone, 
nothing  I  could  say  had  any  weight  with  him  ;  nor  would 
he  be  persuaded  to  stay  longer  than  for  a  little  tea.  Stay- 
ing so  short  a  time,  he  found  it  difficult  to  account  foi 
Having  ever  come.    But  it  was  too  evidently  useless  t^ 


CHABLES  LLOYD. 


527 


wgue  the  point  with  him ;  for  he  was  altered,  and  had 
become  obstinate  and  intractable.  I  prepared,  therefore, 
to  gratify  him  according  to  his  own  plan,  by  bearing  him. 
company  on  the  road  to  Ambleside,  and  (as  he  said)  to 
Brathay.  We  set  off  on  foot :  the  distance  to  Ambleside 
is  about  three  and  a  half  miles ;  and  one-third  of  this 
distance  brought  us  to  an  open  plain  on  the  margin  of 
Rydalmere,  where  the  road  lies  entirely  open  to  the 
water.  This  lake  is  unusually  shallow,  by  comparison 
with  all  its  neighbors  ;  but,  at  the  point  I  speak  of,  it 
takes  (especially  when  seen  under  any  mode  of  imperfect 
light)  the  appearance  of  being  gloomily  deep  :  two  islands 
of  exquisite  beauty,  but  strongly  discriminated  in  charac- 
ter, and  a  sort  of  recess  or  bay  in  the  opposite  shore, 
across  which  the  shadows  of  the  hilly  margin  stretch  with 
great  breadth  and  solemnity  of  effect  to  the  very  centre  of 
the  lake,  together  with  the  very  solitary  character  of  the 
entire  valley,  on  which  (excluding  the  little  hamlet  in  its 
very  gorge  or  entrance)  there  is  not  more  than  one  single 
house,  combine  to  make  the  scene  as  impressive  by  night 
as  any  in  the  lake  country.  At  this  poiift  it  was  that  my 
poor  friend  paused  to  converse,  and,  as  it  seemed,  to  take 
his  leave,  with  an  air  of  peculiar  sadness,  as  if  he  had 
foreseen  (what  in  fact  proved  to  be  the  truth)  that  we  now 
saw  each  other  for  the  final  time.  The  spot  seemed 
favorable  to  confidential  talk ;  and  here,  therefore,  ho 
proceeded  to  make  his  heart-rendering  communication : 
here  he  told  me  rapidly  the  tale  of  his  sufferings,  and, 
what  oppressed  his  mind  far  more  than  those  at  this 
present  moment,  of  the  cruel  indignities  to  which  he  had 
leen  under  the  necessity  of  submitting.  In  particular, 
he  said,  that  a  man  of  great  muscular  power  had  in- 
structions to  knock  him  down  whenever  he  made  any  al- 
lusion to  certain  speculative  subjects,  which  the  presiding 


528 


LITEBAKY  REMINISCENCES. 


authorities  of  the  asylum  chose  to  think  connected  with  his 
unhappy  disease.  Many  other  brutalities,  damnable  and 
dishonoring  to  human  nature,  were  practised  in  this 
asylum,  not  always  by  abuse  of  the  powers  lodged  in  the 
servants,  but  by  direct  authority  from  the  governors  ;  and 
yet  it  had  been  selected  as  the  one  most  favorable  to  a 
liberal  treatment  of  the  patients  ;  and,  in  reality,  it  con- 
tinued to  hold  a  very  high  reputation. 

Great  and  monstrous  are  the  abuses  which  have  been 
detected  in  such  institutions,  and  exposed  by  parliamentary 
interference,  as  well  as  by  the  energy  of  individual  philan- 
thropists ;  but  it  occurs  to  one  most  forcibly,  that,  after  all, 
the  light  of  this  parliamentary  torch  must  have  been  but 
feeble  and  partial,  when  it  was  possible  for  cases  such  as 
these  to  escape  all  general  notice,  and  for  the  establishment 
which  fostered  them  to  retain  a  character  as  high  as  any 
in  the  land  for  enlightened  humanity.  Perhaps  the  para- 
mount care  in  the  treatment  of  lunatics  should  be  directed 
towards  those  appliances,  and  that  mode  of  discipline,  which 
is  best  fitted  ^or  restoring  the  patient  finally  to  a  sane  con- 
dition ;  but  the  second  place  in  the  machinery  of  his  proper 
management,  should  be  reserved  for  that  system  of  atten- 
tions, medical  or  non-medical,  which  have  the  best  chance 
of  making  him  happy  for  the  present;  and  especially 
because  his  present  happiness  must  always  be  one  of  the 
directest  avenues  to  his  restoration.  In  the  present  case, 
could  it  be  imagined  that  the  shame,  agitation,  and  fury, 
which  convulsed  poor  L  ,  as  he  went  over  the  circum- 
stances of  his  degradation,  were  calculated  for  any  other 
than  the  worst  efi*ects  upon  the  state  and  prospects  of  his 
malady?  By  sustaining  the  tumult  of  his  brain,  they 
must,  almost  of  themselves,  have  precluded  his  restoration. 
At  the  side  of  that  quiet  lake  he  stood  for  nearly  an  houi 
repeating  his  wrongs,  his  eyes  glaring  continually,  as  th« 


CHARLES  LLOYP. 


529 


light  thrown  off  from  those  parts  of  the  lake  which  reflected 
bright  tracts  of  sky  amongst  the  clouds  fitfully  illuminated 
them,  and  again  and  again  threatening,  with  gestures  the 
wildest,  vengeance  the  most  savage  upon  those  vile  keepers 
who  had  so  abused  any  just  purposes  of  authority.  He 
would  talk  of  little  else  ;  apparently  he  could  not.  A 
hollow  effort  he  would  make  now  and  then,  when  his  story 
had  apparently  reached  its  close,  to  sustain  the  topic  of  or- 
dinary conversation  ;  but  in  a  minute  he  had  relapsed  into 
the  one  subject  which  possessed  him.  In  vain  1  pressed  him 
to  return  with  me  to  Grasmere.  He  was  now,  for  a  few 
nours  to  come,  to  be  befriended  by  the  darkness  ;  and  he 
resolved  to  improve  the  opportunity  for  some  purpose  of  his 
own,  which,  as  he  showed  no  disposition  to  communicate 
any  part  of  his  future  plans,  I  did  not  directly  inquire  into. 
In  fact,  part  of  his  purpose  in  stopping  where  he  did,  had 
been  to  let  me  know  that  he  did  not  wish  for  company  any 
further.  We  parted ;  and  I  saw  him  no  more.  He  was 
soon  recaptured  ;  then  transferred  to  some  more  eligible 
asylum ;  then  liberated  from  all  restraint ;  after  which, 
with  his  family,  he  went  to  France  ;  where  again  it  became 
necessary  to  deprive  him  of  liberty.  And,  finally,  in 
France  it  was  that  his  feverish  existence  found  at  length  a 
natural  rest  and  an  everlasting  liberty  ;  for  there  it  was, 
in  a  maison  de  sante,  at  or  near  Versailles,  that  he  died, 
(and  I  believe  tranquilly,)  a  few  years  after  he  had  left 
England.  Death  was  indeed  to  him,  in  the  words  of  that 
fine  mystic,  Blake  the  artist,  a  ♦  golden  gate  '  —  the  gate 
of  liberation  from  the  captivity  of  half  a  life  ;  or,  as  I 
once  found  the  case  beautifully  expressed  in  a  volume  of 
poems  a  century  old,  and  otherwise  poor  enough,  for  they 
offered  nothing  worth  recollecting  beyond  this  single  line, 
in  speaking  of  the  particular  morning  in  which  some  yv'>uDg 
man  had  died  — 

'  That  morning  brought  him  peace  and  liberty.* 

84 


530 


lilTEBAKY  BEMINISCENCES. 


Charles  L          never  returned  to  Brathay  after  he  had 

once  been  removed  from  it ;  and  the  removal  of  his  family 

loon  followed.    Mrs.  L  ,  indeed,  returned  at  intervals 

from  France  to  England,  upon  business  connected  with 
the  interests  of  her  family ;  and,  during  one  of  those 
fugitive  visits,  she  came  to  the  Lakes,  where  she  selected 
Grasmere  for  her  residence,  so  that  I  had  opportunities 
of  seeing  her  every  day,  for  a  space  of  several  weeks. 
Otherwise,  I  never  again  saw  any  of  the  family,  except 
one  son,  an  interesting  young  man,  who  sought  most 
meritoriously,'  by  bursting  asunder  the  heavy  yoke  of  con- 
stitutional inactivity,  to  extract  a  balm  for  his  own  besetting 
melancholy,  from  a  constant  series  of  exertions  in  which 
he  had  forced  himself  to  engage,  for  promoting  education 
or  religious  knowledge  amongst  his  poorer  neighbors. 
But  often  and  often,  in  years  after  all  was  gone,  I  have 
passed  old  Brathay,  or  have  gone  over  purposely  after  dark, 
about  the  time  when,  for  many  a  year,  I  used  to  go  over  to 
spend  the  evening  ;  and,  seating  myself  on  a  stone,  by  the 
side  of  the  mountain  river  Brathay,  have  staid  for  hours 

listening  to  the  same  sound  to  which  so  often  C  L  

and  I  used  to  hearken  together  with  profound  emotion  and 
awe  —  the  sound  of  pealing  anthems,  as  if  streaming  from 
the  open  portals  of  some  illimitable  cathedral ;  for  such  a 
sound  does  actually  arise,  in  many  states  of  the  weather, 
from  the  peculiar  action  of  the  river  Brathay  upon  its  rocky 
bed ;  and  many  times  I  have  heard  it,  of  a  quiet  night, 
when  no  stranger  could  have  been  persuaded  to  believe  it 
other  than  the  sound  of  choral  chanting  —  distant,  solemn, 
saintly.  Its  meaning  and  expression  were,  in  those  earlier 
years,  uncertain  and  general  ;  not  more  pointed  or  deter- 
mined in  the  direction  which  it  impressed  upon  one's 
feelings  than  the  light  of  setting  suns  :  and  sweeping,  in 
fact,  the  whole  harp  of  pensive  sensibilities,  rather  than 
•triking  the  chord  of  any  one  specific  sentiment. 


CHABLES  LLOYD. 


531 


But  smce  the  ruin  or  dispersion  of  that  household,  after 
he  smoke  had  ceased  to  ascend  from  their  hearth,  or  the 
garden  walks  to  re-echo  their  voices,  oftentimes,  when 
lying  by  the  river  side,  I  have  listened  to  the  same  aerial 
saintly  sound,  whilst  looking  back  to  that  night,  long  hidden 
in  the  frost  of  receding  years,  when  Charles  and  Sophia 

L  ,  now  lying  in  foreign  graves,  first  dawned  upon  me, 

coming  suddenly  out  of  rain  and  darkness  ;  then  —  young, 
rich,  happy,  full  of  hope,  belted  with  young  children,  (of 
whom  also  most  are  long  dead,)  and  standing  apparently 
on  the  verge  of  a  labyrinth  of  golden  hours.  Musing  on 
that  night  in  November,  1807,  and  then  upon  the  wreck 
that  had  been  wrought  by  a  space  of  fifteen  years,  I  would 
say  to  myself  sometimes,  and  seem  to  hear  it  in  the  songs 
of  this  watery  cathedral  —  Put  not  your  trust  in  any  fabric 
of  happiness  that  has  its  root  in  man  or  the  children  of 
men.  Sometimes  even  I  was  tempted  to  discover  in  the 
same  music,  a  sound  such  as  this  —  Love  nothing,  love 
nobody,  for  thereby  comes  a  killing  curse  in  the  rear.  But 
sometimes  also,  very  early  on  a  summer  morning,  when 
the  dawn  was  barely  beginning  to  break,  all  things  locked 
in  sleep,  and  only  some  uneasy  murmur  or  cock-crow,  at 
a  faint  distance,  giving  a  hint  of  resurrection  for  earth  and 
her  generations,  I  have  heard  in  that  same  chanting  of 
the  little  mountain  river,  a  more  solemn  if  a  less  agitated 
admonition  —  a  requiem  over  departed  happiness,  and  a 
protestation  against  the  thought  that  so  many  excellent 
creatures,  but  a  little  lower  than  the  angels,  whom  I  have 
seen  only  to  love  in  this  life  —  so  many  of  the  good,  the 
brave,  the  beautiful,  the  wise  —  can  have  appeared  for  no 
higher  purpose  or  prospect  than  simply  to  point  a  moral, 
to  cause  a  little  joy  and  many  tears,  a  few  perishing  moons 
of  happiness  and  years  of  vain  regret  —  No  !  that  the 
lestiny  of  man  is  more  in  correspondence  with  the  gran- 


532 


I.ITEBARY  BEMINISCENCES. 


deur  of  his  endowments  ;  and  that  our  own  mysterious 
tendencies  are  written  hieroglyphically  in  the  vicissitudes 
of  day  and  night,  of  winter  and  summer,  and  throughout 
the  great  alphabet  of  Nature.  But  on  that  theme  —  Be- 
ivare,  reader  !  Listen  to  no  intellectual  argument.  One 
argument  there  is,  one  only  there  is,  of  philosophic  value  : 
an  argument  drawn  from  the  moral  nature  of  man  :  an 
argument  of  Immanuel  Kant's.  The  rest  w:e  dust  and 
ashes. 


60CIETY  OF  THE  LAKES. 


CHAPTER  XIX. 

SOCIETY  OF  THE  LAKES. 


Passing  onwards  from  Brathay,  a  ride  of  about  fortj 
minutes  carries  you  to  the  summit  of  a  wild  heathy  tract, 
along  which,  even  at  noonday,  few  sounds  are  heard 
that  indicate  the  presence  of  man,  except  now  and  then  a 
woodman's  axe,  in  some  of  the  many  coppice-woods 
scattered  about  that  neighborhood.  In  Northern  England 
there  are  no  sheep-bells ;  which  is  an  unfortunate  defect, 
as  regards  the  full  impression  of  wild  solitudes,  whether 
amongst  undulating  heaths,  or  towering  rocks  :  at  any 
rate,  it  is  so  felt  by  those  who,  like  myself,  have  been 
trained  to  its  soothing  effects,  upon  the  hills  of  Somerset- 
shire —  the  Cheddar,  the  Mendip,  or  the  Quantock  —  or 
any  other  of  those  breezy  downs,  \vhich  once  constituted 
such  delightful  local  distinctions  for  four  or  five  counties 
in  that  south-west  angle  of  England.  At  all  hours  of  day 
or  night,  this  silvery  tinkle  was  delightful ;  but,  after  sun- 
set, in  the  solemn  hour  of  gathering  twilight,  heard  (as  it 
always  was)  intermittingly,  and  at  great  varieties  of  dis- 
tance, it  formed  the  most  impressive  incident  for  the  ear, 
and  the  most  in  harmony  with  the  other  circumstances  of 
the  scenery,  that,  perhaps,  anywhere  exists  —  not  ex- 
V  opting  even  the  natural  sounds,  the  swelling  and  dying 
intonations  of  insects  wheeling  in  their  vesper  flights. 
Silence  and  desolation  are  never  felt  so  profoundly  as 


SOCIETY  OF  THE  LAKES. 


when  they  are  interrupted  by  solemn  sounds,  recurring  by 
uncertain  intervals,  and  from  distant  places.  But  in  these 
Westmoreland  heaths,  and  uninhabited  ranges  of  hilly 
ground,  too  often  nothing  is  heard,  except,  occasionally, 
the  wild  cry  of  a  bird  —  the  plover,  the  snipe,  or  perhaps 
the  raven's  croak.  The  general  impression  is,  therefore, 
cheerless  ;  and  the  more  are  you  rejoiced  when,  looking 
down  from  some  one  of  the  eminences  which  you  have 
been  gradually  ascending,  you  descry,  at  a  great  depth 
below,''^'  the  lovely  lake  of  Coniston.  The  head  of  this 
lake  h  the  part  chiefly  interesting,  both  from  the  sublime 
character  of  the  mountain  barriers,  and  from  the  intricacy 
of  the  little  valleys  at  their  base.  On  a  little  verdant 
knoll,  near  the  north-eastern  margin  of  the  lake,  stands  a 
small  villa,  called  Tent  Lodge,  built  by  Colonel  Smith, 
and  for  many  years  occupied  by  his  family.  That 
daughter  of  Colonel  Smith,  who  drew  the  public  attention 
so  powerfully  upon  herself  by  the  splendor  of  her  attain- 
ments, had  died  some  months  before  I  came  into  the 
country.  But  yet,  as  I  was  subsequently  acquainted  with 
her  family  through  the  Lloyds,  (who  were  within  an  easy 
drive  of  Tent  Lodge,)  and  as,  moreover,  with  regard  to 
Miss  Elizabeth  Smith  herself,  I  came  to  know  more  than 
the  world  knew  —  drawing  my  knowledge  from  many  of 
her  friends,  but  especially  from  Mrs.  Hannah  More,  who 

*  The  approach  from  Ambleside  or  Hawkshead,  though  fine,  is  far 
less  so  than  from  Grasmere,  through  the  vale  of  Tilberthwaite,  to 
ivhich,  for  a  coup  de  theatre^  I  recollect  nothing  equal.  Taking  the 
left-hand  road,  so  as  to  make  for  Monk  Coniston,  and  not  for  Church 
(voniston,  you  ascend  a  pretty  steep  hill,  from  which,  at  a  certain 
point  of  the  little  gorge  or  hawse,  (t.  e.  hals,- neck  or  throat,  viz. 
the  dip  in  any  hill  through  which  the  road  is  led,)  the  whole  lake  of 
six  miles  in  length,  and  the  beautiful  foregrounds,  all  rush  upon  the 
eye  with  the  effect  of  a  pantomimic  surprise  —  not  by  a  grad  iated 
revelation,  but  by  an  instantaneous  flash. 


SOCIETY  OF  THE  LAKES. 


535 


had  been  intimately  connected  with  her ;  for  these  reasons, 
I  shall  rehearse  the  leading  points  of  her  story  ;  and  the 
rather,  because  her  family,  who  were  equally  interested 
in  that  story,  long  continued  to  form  part  of  the  Lake 
society. 

On  my  first  becoming  acquainted  ^vith  Miss  Smith's 
pretensions,  it  is  very  true  that  I  regarded  them  with  but 
little  concern;  for  nothing  ever  interests  me  less  than 
great  philological  attainments,  or  at  least  that  mode  of 
philological  learning  which  consists  in  mastery  over 
languages.  But  one  reason  for  this  indifference  is,  that 
the  apparent  splendor  is  too  often  a  false  one.  They 
who  know  a  vast  number  of  languages,  rarely  know  any 
one  with  accuracy  ;  and  the  more  they  gain  in  one  way, 
ihe  more  they  lose  in  another.  With  Miss  Smith,  however, 
I  gradually  came  to  know  that  this  was  not  the  case  ;  or, 
at  any  rate,  but  partially  the  case  ;  for,  of  some  languages 
which  she  possessed,  and  those  the  least  accessible,  it 
appeared,  finally,  that  she  had  even  a  critical  knowledge. 
It  created  also  a  secondary  interest  in  these  difficult 
accomplishments  of  hers,  to  find  that  they  were  so  very 
extensive.  Secondly,  That  they  were  pretty  nearly  all 
of  self-acquisition.  Thirdly,  That  they  were  borne  so 
meekly,  and  with  unaffected  absence  of  all  ostentation. 
As  to  the  first  point,  it  appears  (from  Mrs.  H.  Bowdler's 
Letter  to  Dr.  Mummsen,  the  friend  of  Klopstock)  that  she 
made  herself  mistress  of  the  French,  the  Italian,  the 
Spanish,  the  Latin,  the  German,  the  Greek,  and  the 
Hebrew  languages.  She  had  no  inconsiderable  know- 
ledge of  the  Syriac,  the  Arabic,  and  the  Persic.  She  was 
a  good  geometrician  and  algebraist.  She  was  a  very 
expert  musician.  She  drew  from  nature,  and  had  an 
iccurate  knowledge  of  perspective.  Finally,  she  mani- 
fested an  early  talent  for  poetry ;  but,  from  pure  modesty, 


536 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


destroyed  most  of  what  she  had  written,  as  soon  as  het 
acquaintance  with  the  Hebrew  models  had  elevated  the 
standard  of  true  poetry  in  her  mind,  so  as  to  disgust  her 
with  what  she  now  viewed  as  the  tameness  and  inefficiency 
of  her  own  perforn^ances.  As  to  the  second  point  —  that 
for  these  attainments  she  was  indebted,  almost  exclusively, 
to  her  own  energy  ;  this  is  placed  beyond  all  doubt,  by 
the  fact,  that  the  only  governess  she  ever  had  (a  young 
lady  not  much  beyond  her  own  age)  did  not  he*6elf 
possess,  and  therefore  could  not  have  communicated,  any 
knowledge  of  languages,  beyond  a  little  French  and 
Italian.  Finally,  as  to  the  modesty  with  which  she  wore 
her  distinctions,  that  is  sufficiently  established  by  every 
page  of  her  printed  works,  and  her  letters.  Greater 
diffidence,  as  respected  herself,  or  less  willingness  to 
obtrude  her  knowledge  upon  strangers,  or  even  upon 
those  correspondents  who  would  have  wished  her  to  make 
a  little  more  display,  cannot  be  imagined.  And  yet  I 
repeat,  that  her  knowledge  was  as  sound  and  as  profound 
as  it  was  extensive.  For,  taking  only  one  instance  of  this, 
her  Translation  of  Job  has  been  pronounced,  by  Biblical 
critics  of  the  first  rank,  a  work  of  real  and  intrinsic  value, 
without  any  reference  to  the  disadvantages  of  the  trans- 
lator, or  without  needing  any  allowances  whatever.  In 
particular.  Dr.  Magee,  the  celebrated  writer  on  the  Atone- 
ment, and  subsequently  a  dignitary  of  the  Irish  Church  — 
certainly  one  of  the  best  qualified  judges  at  that  time  — 
describes  it  as  '  conveying  more  of  the  character  and 
meaning  of  the  Hebrew,  with  fewer  departures  from  the 
idiom  of  the  English,  than  any  other  translation  whatever 
*hat  we  possess.*  So  much  for  the  scholarship  ;  whilst  he 
rightly  notices,  in  proof  of  the  translator's  taste  and  dis- 
cretion, that  '  from  the  received  version  she  very  seldom 
unnecessarily  deviates  : '  thus  refusing  to  disturb  what  was 


SOCIETY  OF  THE  LAKES. 


537 


henerally  speaking,  so  excellent  and  time-hallowed  for  any 
dazzling  effects  of  novelty  ;  and  practising  this  forbearance 
as  much  as  possible,  notwithstanding  novelty  was,  after 
all,  the  main  attraction  upon  which  the  new  translation 
must  rest. 

The  example  of  her  modesty,  however,  is  not  more 
instructive  than  that  of  her  continued  struggle  with  diffi- 
culties in  pursuing  knowlege,  and  with  misfortunes  in 
supporting  a  Christian  fortitude.  I  shall  briefly  sketch  her 
story :  —  She  was  born  at  Burnhall,  in  the  county  of 
Durham,  at  the  latter  end  of  the  year  1776.  Early  in 
1782,  when  she  had  just  entered  her  sixth  year,  her 
parents  removed  into  Suffolk,  in  order  to  be  near  a  blind 
relation,  who  looked  with  anxiety  to  the  conscientious 
attentions  of  Mrs.  Smith,  in  superintending  his  comforts 
and  interests.  This  occupation  absorbed  so  much  of  her 
time,  that  she  found  it  necessary  to  obtain  the  aid  of  a 
stranger  in  directing  the  studies  of  her  daughter.  An 
opportunity  just  then  oiSered  of  attaining  this  object,  con- 
cuirently  with  another  not  less  interesting  to  herself,  viz. 
that  of  offering  an  asylum  to  a  young  lady  who  had  recently 
been  thrown  adrift  upon  the  world  by  the  misfortunes  of 
her  parents.  They  had  very  suddenly  fallen  from  a  sta- 
tion of  distinguished  prosperity  ;  and  the  young  lady  her- 
self, then  barely  sixteen,  was  treading  that  path  of  severe 
adversity,  upon  which,  by  a  most  singular  parallelism  of 
ill  fortune,  her  young  pupil  was  destined  to  follow  her 
steps  at  exactly  the  same  age.  Being  so  prematurely 
called  to  the  office  of  governess,  this  young  lady  was 
expected  rather  to  act  as  an  elder  companion,  and  as  a 
lightener  of  the  fatigues  attached  to  their  common  studies, 
than  exactly  as  their  directress.  And,  at  all  events,  from 
tier  who  was  the  only  even  nominal  governess  that  Miss 
Smith  ever  had,  it  is  certain  that  she  could  have  learned 


538 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


little  or  notMng  This  arrangement  subsisted  between 
two  and  three  yeai?,  when  the  death  of  their  blind  kins- 
man allowed  Mr.  Smith's  family  to  leave  Suffolk,  and 
resume  their  old  domicile  of  Burnhall.  But  from  this,  by 
a  sudden  gleam  of  treacherous  prosperity,  they  were  sum- 
moned, in  the  following  year,  (June,  1785,)  to  the  splen- 
did inheritance  of  Piercefield  —  a  show-place  upon  the 
river  Wye ;  and,  next  after  Tintern  Abbey  and  the  river 
itself,  an  object  of  attraction  to  all  who  then  visited  the 
Wye. 

A  residence  on  the  Wye,  besides  its  own  natural  attrac- 
tion, has  this  collateral  advantage,  that  it  brings  Bath  (not 
to  mention  Clifton  and  the  Hot  Wells)  within  a  visiting 
distance  for  people  who  happen  to  have  carriages ;  and 
Bath,  it  is  hardly  necessary  to  say,  besides  its  stationary 
body  of  polished  and  intellectual  residents,  has  also  a 
floating  casual  population  of  eminent  or  interesting  per- 
sons, gathered  into  this  focus  from  every  quarter  of  the 
empire.  Amongst  the  literary  connections  which  the 
Piercefield  family  had  formed  in  Bath,  was  one  with  Mrs. 
Bowdler  and  her  daughter  —  two  ladies  not  distinguished 
by  any  very  powerful  talents,  but  sufficiently  tinctured 
with  literature  and  the  love  of  literature  to  be  liberal  in 
their  opinions.  And,  fortunately,  (as  it  turned  out  for 
Miss  Smith,)  they  were  eminently  religious  :  but  not  in  a 
bigoted  way  ;  for  they  were  conciliating  and  winning  in 
the  outward  expression  of  their  religious  character ;  capa- 
ble of  explaining  their  own  creed  with  intelligent  con- 
sistency ;  and,  finally,  were  the  women  to  recommend 
any  creed,  by  the  sanctity  and  the  benignity  of  their  own 
lives.  This  strong  religious  bias  of  the  two  Bath  ladies, 
/jperated  in  Miss  Smith's  favor  by  a  triple  service.  First 
of  all,  it  was  this  depth  of  religious  feeling,  and,  con- 
lequently,  of  interest  in  the  Scriptures,  which  had  origin- 


SOCIETY  OF  THE  LAKES. 


539 


ally  moved  the  elder  Mrs.  Bowdler  to  study  the  Hebrew 
and  the  Greek,  as  the  two  languages  in  which  they  had 
been  originally  delivered.  And  this  example  it  was  ol 
female  triumph  over  their  difficulties,  together  with  the 
proof  thus  given  that  such  attainments  were  entirely 
reconcilable  with  femine  gentleness,  which  first  sug- 
gested to  Miss  Smith  the  project  of  her  philological 
studies ;  and,  doubtless,  these  studies,  by  the  constant  and 
agreeable  occupation  which  they  afforded,  overspread  the 
whole  field  of  her  life  with  pleasurable  activity.  '  From 
the  above-mentioned  visit,'  says  her  mother,  writing  to 
Dr.  Randolph,  and  referring  to  the  visit  which  these  Bath 
ladies  had  made  to  Piercefield  — '  from  the  above-men- 
tioned visit  I  date  the  turn  of  study  which  Elizabeth  ever 
after  pursued,  and  which  I  firmly  believe  the  amiable 
conduct  of  our  guests  first  led  her  to  delight  in.'  Second-  . 
ly,  to  the  religious  sympathies  which  connected  these 
two  ladies  with  Miss  Smith,  was  owing  the  fervor  of 
that  friendship,  which  afterwards,  in  their  adversity,  the 
Piercefield  family  found  more  strenuously  exerted  in  their 
behalf  by  the  Bowdlers  than  by  all  the  rest  of  their  con- 
nections. And,  finally,  it  was  this  piety  and  religious 
resignation,  with  which  she  had  been  herself  inoculated 
by  her  Bath  friends,  that,  throughout  the  calamitous  era 
of  her  life,  enabled  Miss  Elizabeth  Smith  to  maintain  her 
own  cheerfulness  unbroken,  and  greatly  to  support  the 
failing  fortitude  of  her  mother. 

This  visit  of  her  Bath  friends  to  Piercefield  —  so 
memorable  an  event  for  the  whole  subsequent  life  of  Miss 
Smith  —  occurred  in  the  summer  of  1789;  consequently, 
when  she  was  just  twelve  and  a  half  years  old.  And  the 
Vmpressions  then  made  upon  her  childish,  but  unusually 
thoughtful,  mind,  were  kept  up  by  continual  communi- 
cations, personal  or  written,  through  the  years  immediately 


540 


LITEKART  EEMIITISCENCES. 


succeeding.  Just  two  and  a  half  years  after,  in  the  vtry 
month  when  Miss  Smith  accomplished  her  fifteenth  year, 
upon  occasion  of  going  through  the  rite  of  Confirmation, 
according  to  the  discipline  of  the  English  Church,  she 
received  a  letter  of  religious  counsel  —  grave,  affectionate, 
but  yet  humble  —  from  the  elder  Mrs.  Bowdler,  which 
might  almost  have  been  thought  to  have  proceeded  from  a 
writer  who  had  looked  behind  the  curtain  of  fate,  and  had 
seen  the  forge  at  whose  fires  the  shafts  of  Heaven  were 
even  now  being  forged. 

Just  twelve  months  from  the  date  of  this  letter,  in  the 
very  month  when  Miss  Elizabeth  Smith  completed  her 
sixteenth  year,  tha  storm  descended  upon  the  house  of 
Piercefield.  The  whole  estate,  a  splendid  one,  was  swept 
away,  by  the  failure  (as  I  have  heard)  of  one  banking- 

.  house ;  nor  was  there  recovered,  until  some  years  after, 
any  slender  fragments  of  that  estate.  Piercefield  was,  of 
course,  sold ;  but  that  was  not  the  heaviest  of  her 
grievances  to  Miss  Smith.  She  was  now  far  advanced 
upon  her  studious  career ;  for  it  should  be  mentioned,  as 

.  a  lesson  to  other  young  ladies  of  what  may  be  accom- 
plished by  unassisted  labor,  that,  between  the  ages  of 
thirteen  and  twenty-one,  all  her  principal  acquisitions 
were  made.  No  treasure,  therefore,  could,  in  her  eyes, 
be  of  such  priceless  value  as  the  Piercefield  library  ;  but 
this  also  followed  the  general  wreck :  not  a  volume,  not  a 
pamphlet,  was  reserved ;  for  the  family  were  proud  in 
their  integrity,  and  would  receive  no  favors  from  the 
creditors.  Under  this  scorching  test,  applied  to  the 
fidelity  of  friends,  many,  whom  Mrs.  Smith  mentions  in 
one  of  her  letters  under  the  name  of  'summer  friends,' 
fled  from  them  by  crowds :  dinners,  balls,  soirees  — 
credit,  influence,  support  —  these  things  were  no  longer 
to  be  had  from  Piercefield.    But  more  annoying  evei 


SOCIETY  OF  THE  LAKES. 


541 


thaa  the  fickle  levity  of  such  open  deserters,  was  the 
timid  and  doubtful  countenance,  as  I  have  heard  Mrs. 
Smith  say,  which  was  still  offered  to  them  by  some  who 
did  not  relish,  for  their  own  sakes,  being  classed  with 
those  who  had  paid  their  homage  only  to  the  fine  house 
and  fine  equipages  of  Piercefield.  These  persons  con- 
tinued, therefore,  to  send  invitations  to  the  family ;  but  so 
frigidly,  that  every  expression  manifested  but  too  forcibly 
how  disagreeable  was  the  duty  with  which  they  were 
complying ;  and  how  much  more  they  submitted  to  it  foi 
their  own  reputation's  sake,  than  for  any  kindness  they 
felt  to  their  old  friends.  Mrs.  Smith  v/as  herself  a  very 
haughty  woman,  and  it  maddened  her  to  be  the  object  of 
condescensions  so  insolent  and  so  reluctant. 

Meantime,  her  daughter,  young  as  she  was,  became  the 
moral  support  of  her  whole  family,  and  the  fountain  from 
which  they  all  drew  consolation  and  fortitude.  She  was 
confirmed  in  her  religious  tendencies  by  two  circumstances 
of  her  recent  experience  :  one  was,  that  she,  the  sole  per- 
son of  her  family  who  courted  religious  consolations,  was 
also  the  sole  person  who  had  been  able  to  maintain  cheer- 
fulness and  uniform  spirits :  the  other  was,  that  although 
it  could  not  be  truly  said  of  all  their  worldly  friends  that 
they  had  forsaken  them,  yet,  of  their  religious  friends  it 
could  be  said,  not  one  had  done  so ;  and  at  last,  when  for 
some  time  they  had  been  so  far  reduced  as  not  to  have  a 
roof  over  their  heads,  by  one  of  these  religious  friends  it 
was  that  they  were  furnished  with  every  luxury  as  well  as 
comfort  of  life ;  and,  in  a  spirit  of  such  sisterly  kindness, 
as  made  the  obligation  not  painful  to  the  proudest  amongst 
them. 

It  was  in  1792  that  the  Piercefield  family  had  been 
turned;  and  in  1794,  out  of  the  wrecks  which  had  been 
gathered  together,  Mr.  Smith  (the  father  of  the  family} 


542 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


bouglat  a  commission  in  the  army.  For  some  time  the 
family  continued  to  live  in  London,  Bath,  and  other 
parts  of  England  ;  but,  at  length,  Mr.  Smith's  regiment 
was  ordered  to  the  west  of  Ireland  ;  and  the  ladies  of  his 
family  resolved  to  accompany  him  to  head -quarters.  In 
passing  through  Wales,  (May,  1796,)  they  paid  a  visit  to 
those  sentimental  anchorites  of  the  last  generation,  whom 
BO  many  of  us  must  still  remember  —  Miss  Ponsonby,  and 
Lady  Eleanor  Butler,  (a  sister  of  Lord  Ormond,)  whose 
hermitage  stood  near  to  Llangollen,  and,  therefore,  close 
to  the  usual  Irish  route,  by  way  of  Holyhead.  On  landing 
in  Ireland,  they  proceeded  to  a  seat  of  Lord  Kingston  —  a 
kind-hearted,  hospitable  Irishman,  who  was  on  the  old 
Piercefield  list  of  friends,  and  had  never  wavered  in  his 
attachment.  Here  they  stayed  three  weeks.  Miss  Smith 
renewed,  on  this  occasion,  her  friendship  with  Lady 
Isabella  King,  the  daughter  of  Lord  Kingston  ;  and  a 
little  incident  connected  with  this  visit,  gave  her  an  oppor- 
tunity afterwards  of  showing  her  delicate  sense  of  the 
sacred  character  which  attaches  to  gifts  of  friendship,  and 
showing  it  by  an  ingenious  device,  that  may  be  worth  the 
notice  of  other  young  ladies  in  the  same  case.  Lady 
Isabella  had  given  to  Miss  Smith  a  beautiful  horse,  called 
Brunette.  In  process  of  time,  w^hen  they  had  ceased  to  be 
in  the  neighborhood  of  any  regimental  stables,  it  became 
matter  of  necessity  that  Brunette  should  be  parted  with. 
To  have  given  the  animal  away,  had  that  been  otherwise 
possible,  might  only  have  been  delaying  the  sale  for  a 
short  time.  After  some  demur,  therefore,  Miss  Smith 
adopted  this  plan :  she  sold  Brunette,  but  applied  the 
whole  of  the  price,  120  guineas,  to  the  purchase  of  a 
Bplendid  harp.  The  harp  was  christened  Brunette,  and 
was  religiously  preserved  to  the  end  of  her  life.  Now 
Brunette,  after  all,  must  have  died  in  a  few  years  ;  but 


SOCIETY  OF  THE  LAKES. 


543 


by  translating  her  friend's  gift  into  another  form,  she  not 
only  connected  the  image  of  her  distant  friend,  and  her 
sense  of  that  friend's  kindness,  with  a  pleasure  and  a  use- 
ful purpose  of  her  own,  but  she  conferred  on  that  gift  a 
perpetuity  of  existence. 

At  length  came  the  day  when  the  Smiths  were  to  quit 
Kingston  Lodge  for  the  quarters  of  the  regiment.  And 
now  came  the  first  rude  trial  of  Mrs.  Smith's  fortitude,  as 
connected  with  points  of  mere  decent  comfort.  Hitherto, 
floating  amongst  the  luxurious  habitations  of  opulent 
friends,  she  might  have  felt  many  privations  as  regarded 
splendor  and  direct  personal  power,  but  never  as  regarded 
the  primary  elements  of  comfort,  warmth,  cleanliness, 
convenient  arrangements.  But  on  this  journey,  which 
was  performed  by  all  the  party  on  horseback,  it  rained 
incessantly.  They  reached  their  quarters  drenched  with 
wet,  weary,  hungry,  forlorn.  The  quartermaster  had 
neglected  to  give  any  directions  for  their  suitable  accom- 
modation —  no  preparations  whatever  had  been  made  for 
receiving  them  ;  and,  from  the  luxuries  of  Lord  King- 
ston's mansion,  which  habit  had  made  so  familiar  to  them 
*  all,  the  ladies  found  themselves  suddenly  transferred  to  a 
miserable  Irish  cabin  —  dirty,  narrow,  nearly  quite  unfur- 
nished, and  thoroughly  disconsolate.  Mrs.  Smith's  proud 
spirit  fairly  gave  way,  and  she  burst  out  into  a  fit  of 
weeping.  Upon  this,  her  daughter  Elizabeth,  [and  Mrs. 
Smith  herself  it  was  that  told  the  anecdote,  and  often  she 
told  it,  or  told  others  of  the  same  character,  at  Lloyd's,] 
n  a  gentle,  soothing  tone,  began  to  suggest  the  many 
blessings  which  lay  before  them  in  life,  and  some  even  for 
this  evening. 

'  Blessings,  child  ! '  —  her   mother  impatiently  inter- 
^pted  her.    «  What  sort  of  blessings  ?    Irish  blessings  ! 
-  county  of  Sligo  blessings,  I  fancy.    Or,  perhaps,  you 


544 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


call  this  a  blessing  ?  '  holding  up  a  miserable  fragment  of 
an  iron  rod,  which  had  been  left  by  way  of  poker,  or 
rather  as  a  substitute  for  the  whole  assortment  of  fire-irons. 
The  daughter  laughed  ;  but  she  changed  her  wet  dress  ex- 
peditiously, assumed  an  apron ;  and  so  various  were  her 
accomplishments,  that,  in  no  long  time,  she  had  gathered 
together  a  very  comfortable  dinner  for  her  parents,  and, 
amongst  other  things,  a  currant  tart,  which  she  had  herself 
made,  in  a  tenement  absolutely  unfurnished  of  every 
kitchen  utensil. 

In  the  autumn  of  this  year,  (1796,)  they  returned  to 
England  ;  and,  after  various  migrations  through  the  next 
four  years,  amongst  which  was  another  and  longer  visit  to 
Ireland,  in  1800,  they  took  up  their  abode  in  the  seques- 
tered vale  of  Patterdale.  Here  they  had  a  cottage  upon 
the  banks  of  Ulleswater ;  the  most  gorgeous  of  the 
English  lakes,  from  the  rich  and  ancient  woods  which 
possess  a  great  part  of  its  western  side ;  the  sublimest,  as 
respects  its  mountain  accompaniments,  except  only,  per- 
haps, Wastdale  ;  and,  I  believe,  the  largest ;  for,  though 
only  nine  miles  in  length,  and,  therefore,  shorter  by  about 
two  miles  than  Windermere,  it  averages  a  greater  breadth. 
Here,  at  this  time,  was  living  Mr.  Clarkson  —  that  son  of 
thunder,  that  Titan,  who  was  in  fact  that  one  great  Atlas 
that  bore  up  the  Slave-Trade  abolition  cause  —  now  rest- 
ing from  his  mighty  labors  and  nerve-shattering  perils. 
So  much  had  his  nerves  been  shattered  by  all  that  he  had 
gone  through  in  toil,  in  suffering,  and  in  anxiety,  that,  for 
many  years  I  have  heard  it  said,  he  found  himself  unable 
to  walk  up  stairs  without  tremulous  motions  of  his  limbs. 
He  was,  perhaps,  too  iron  a  man,  too  much  like  the  TaJm 
of  Spenser's  '  Faerie  Queene,'  to  appreciate  so  gentle  a 
creature  as  Miss  Elizabeth  Smith.  A  more  suitable  friend, 
tnd  one  who  thoroughly  comprehended  her,  and  expressed 


SOCIETY  or  THE  LAKES. 


545 


his  admiration  for  her  in  verse,  was  Thomas  Wilkinson  of 
Yanwath,  a  Quaker,  a  man  of  taste,  and  of  delicate  sensi- 
bility. He  wrote  verses  occasionally  ;  and  though  feebly 
enough  as  respected  poetic  power,  there  were  often  such 
delicate  touches  of  feeling,  such  gleams  of  real  tenderness, 
in  some  redeeming  part  of  each  poem,  that  even  Words- 
^worth  admired  and  read  them  aloud  with  pleasure.  In- 
deed Wordsworth  has  addressed  to  him  one  copy  of 
verses,  or  rather  to  his  spade,  which  was  printed  in  the 
collection  of  1807,  and  which  Lord  Jeffrey,  after  quoting 
one  line,  dismissed  as  too  dull  for  repetition. 

During  this  residence  upon  Ulleswater  (winter  of  1800) 
it  was  that  a  very  remarkable  incident  befell  Miss  Smith. 
I  have  heard  it  often  mentioned,  and  sometimes  with  a 
slight  variety  of  circumstances  ;  but  I  here  repeat  it  from 
an  account  drawn  up  by  Miss  Smith  herself,  who  was 
mjst  literally  exact  and  faithful  to  the  truth  in  all  reports 
of  her  own  personal  experience.  There  is,  on  the  west- 
ern side  of  Ulleswater,  a  fine  cataract,  (or,  in  the  language 
of  the  country,  a  force,)  known  by  the  name  of  Airey 
Force  ;  and  it  is  of  importance  enough,  especially  in  rainy 
seasons,  to  attract  numerous  visitors  from  among  '  the 
Lakers.'  Thither,  with  some  purpose  of  sketching,  not 
the  whole  scene,  but  some  picturesque  features  of  it,  Miss 
Smith  had  gone,  quite  unaccompanied.  The  road  to  it 
lies  through  Gobarrow  Park  ;  and  it  was  usual,  at  that 
time,  to  take  a  guide  from  the  family  of  the  Duke  of 
Norfolk's  keeper,  who  lived  in  Lyulph's  Tower  —  a  soli- 
tary hunting  lodge,  built  by  his  Grace  for  the  purposes  of 
an  annuul  visit  which  he  used  to  pay  to  his  estates  in  that 
part  of  England.  She,  however,  thinking  herself  suffi- 
Vently  familiar  with  the  localities,  had  declined  to  encum- 
ber her  motions  with  such  an  attendant ;  consequently  she 
^as  alone.  For  hal^  an  hour  or  more,  she  continued  to 
35 


54G 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


ascend  :  and,  being  a  good  *  cragswoman,'  from  the  expe- 
rience she  had  won  in  Wales  as  well  as  in  northern  Eng- 
land, she  had  reached  an  altitude  much  beyond  what 
would  generally  be  thought  corresponding  to  the  time 
The  path  had  vanished  altogether  ;  but  she  continued 
to  pick  out  one  for  herself  amongst  the  stones,  sometimes 
receding  from  the  force^  sometimes  approaching  it,  ac-  ^ 
cording  to  the  openings  allowed  by  the  scattered  masses 
of  rock.  Pressing  forward  in  this  hurried  way,  and  never 
looking  back,  all  at  once  she  found  herself  in  a  little  stony 
chamber,  from  which  there  was  no  egress  possible  in 
advance.  She  stopped  and  looked  up.  There  was  a 
frightful  silence  in  the  air.  She  felt  a  sudden  palpitation 
at  her  heart,  and  a  panic  from  she  knew  not  what.  Turn- 
ing, however,  hastily,  she  soon  wound  herself  out  of  this 
aerial  dungeon  ;  but  by  steps  so  rapid  and  agitated,  that, 
at  length,  on  looking  round,  she  found  herself  standing  at 
the  brink  of  a  chasm,  frightful  to  look  down.  That  way, 
it  was  clear  enough,  all  retreat  was  impossible  ;  but,  on 
turning  round,  retreat  seemed  in  every  direction  alike 
even  more  impossible.  Down  the  chasm,  at  least,  she 
might  have  leaped,  though  with  little  or  no  chance  of 
escaping  with  life  ;  but  on  all  other  quarters  it  seemed  to 
her  eye  that,  at  no  price,  could  she  effect  an  exit,  since 
the  rocks  stood  round  her,  in  a  semi-circus,  all  lofty,  all 
perpendicular,  all  glazed  with  trickling  water,  or  smooth 
as  polished  porphyry.  Yet  how,  then,  had  she  reached 
the  point  ?  The  same  track,  if  she  could  hit  that  track, 
would  surely  secure  her  escape.  Round  and  round  she 
walked  ;  gazed  with  almost  despairing  eyes  ;  her  breath 
came  thicker  and  thicker  ;  for  path  she  could  not  trace  by 
which  it  was  possible  for  her  to  have  entered.  Finding 
herself  grow  more  and  more  confused,  and  every  instant 
nearer  to  sinking  into  some  fainting  fit  or  convulsion,  she 


SOCIETY  OF  THE  LAKES. 


547 


lesolved  to  sit  down  and  turn  her  thoughts  quietly  into 
some  less  exciting  channel.  This  she  did  ;  gradually  re- 
covered some  self-possession  ;  and  then  suddenly  a  thought 
rose  up  to  her,  that  she  was  in  the  hands  of  God,  and  that 
he  would  not  forsake  her.  But  immediately  came  a 
second  and  reproving  thought  —  that  this  confidence  in 
God's  protection  might  have  heen  justified  had  she  heen 
ascending  the  rocks  upon  any  mission  of  duty  ;  hut  what 
right  could  she  have  to  any  providential  deliverance,  who 
had  been  led  thither  in  a  spirit  of  levity  and  carelessness  ? 
I  am  here  giving  her  view  of  the  case  ;  for,  as  to  myself, 
I  fear  greatly,  that  if  her  steps  were  erring  ones,  it  is  but 
peldom  indeed  that  nous  auires  can  pretend  to  be  treading 
upon  right  paths.  Once  again  she  rose  !  and,  supporting 
herself  upon  a  little  sketching-stool  that  folded  up  into  a 
stick,  she  looked  upwards,  in  the  hope  that  some  shepherd 
might,  by  chance,  he  wandering  in  those  aerial  regions  j 
but  nothing  could  she  see  except  the  tall  birches  growing 
at  the  brink  of  the  highest  summits,  and  the  clouds  slowly 
sailing  overhead.  Suddenly,  however,  as  she  swept  the 
wh-ole  circuit  of  her  station  with  her  alarmed  eye,  she  saw 
clearly,  about  two  hundred  yards  beyond  her  own  position, 
a  lady,  in  a  white  muslin  morning  robe,  such  as  were  then 
universally  worn  by  young  ladies  until  dinner-time.  The 
lady  beckoned  with  a  gesture  and  in  a  manner  that,  in  a 
moment,  gave  her  confidence  to  advance  —  Aoz^?  she  could 
not  guess,  but  in  some  way  that  baffled  all  power  to  re- 
trace it,  she  found  instantaneously  the  outlet  which  pre- 
viously had  escaped  her.  She  continued  to  advance 
towards  the  lady,  whom  now,  in  the  same  moment,  she 
found  to  be  standing  upon  the  other  side  of  the  ^brce,  and 
«lso  to  be  her  own  sister.  How  or  why  that  young  lady, 
whom  she  had  left  at  home  earnestly  occupied  with  hei 
Dwn  studies,  should  have  followed  and  overtaken  her, 


548 


LIIEEAKY  BEMINISCENCES. 


filled  lier  with  perplexity.  But  this  was  no  situation  for 
putting  questions  ;  for  the  guiding  sister  began  to  descend, 
and,  by  a  few  simple  gestures,  just  serving  to  indicate 
when  Miss  Elizabeth  was  to  approach  and  when  to  leave 
the  brink  of  the  torrent,  she  gradually  led  her  down  to  a 
platform  of  rock,  from  which  the  further  descent  was  safe 
and  conspicuous.  There  Miss  Smith  paused,  in  order  to 
take  breath  from  her  panic,  as  well  as  to  exchange  greet- 
ings and  questions  with  her  sister.  But  sister  there  was 
none.  All  trace  of  her  had  vanished  ;  and  when,  in  two 
hours  after,  she  reached  her  home.  Miss  Smith  found  her 
sister  in  the  same  situation  and  employment  in  which  she 
had  left  her  ;  and  the  whole  family  assured  her  that  she 
had  never  stirred  from  the  house. 

In  1801,  I  believe  it  was  that  the  family  removed  from 
Patterdale  to  Coniston.  Certainly  they  were  settled  there 
in  the  spring  of  1802  ;  for,  in  the  May  of  that  spring.  Miss 
Elizabeth  Hamilton  —  a  writer  now  very  much  forgotten, 
or  remembered  only  by  her  '  Cottagers  of  Glenburnie,' 
but  then  a  person  of  mark  and  authority  in  the  literary 
circles  of  Edinburgh  —  paid  a  visit  to  the  Lakes,  and 
stayed  there  for  many  months,  together  with  her  married 
sister,  Mrs.  Blake  ;  and  both  ladies  cultivated  the  friend- 
ship of  the  Smiths.  Miss  Hamilton  was  captivated  with  the 
family  ;  and,  of  the  sisters  in  particular,  she  speaks  as  of 
persons  that,  '  in  the  days  of  paganism,  would  have  been 
worshipped  as  beings  of  a  superior  order,  so  elegantly 
graceful  do  they  appear,  when,  with  easy  motion,  they 
guide  their  light  boat  over  the  waves.'  And  of  Miss  Eliza- 
beth, separately,  she  says,  on  another  occasion,  — '  I  never 
before  saw  so  much  of  Miss  Smith ;  and,  in  the  three  days 
ihe  spent  with  us,  the  admiration  which  I  had  always  felt 
for  her  extraordinary  talents,  and  as  extraordinary  virtues, 
was  hourly  augmented.    She  is,  indeed,  a  most  charming 


SOCIETY  OP  THE  LAKES. 


549 


ereature  ;  and,  if  one  could  inoculate  her  witt  a  little  of 
the  Scotch  frankness,  I  tliink  she  would  be  one  of  the  most 
perfect  of  human  beings.' 

About  four  years  had  been  delightfully  passed  in 
Coniston.  In  the  summer  of  1805,  Miss  Smith  laid  the 
foundation  of  her  fatal  illness  in  the  following  way,  accord- 
ing to  her  own  account  of  the  case,  to  an  old  servant,  a 
very  short  time  before  she  died  :  — '  One  very  hot  evening, 
in  July,  I  took  a  book,  and  walked  about  two  miles  from 
home,  when  I  seated  myself  on  a  stone  beside  the  lake. 
Being  much  engaged  by  a  poem  I  was  reading,  I  did  not 
perceive  that  the  sun  was  gone  down,  and  was  succeeded 
by  a  very  heavy  dew,  till,  in  a  moment,  I  felt  struck  on  the 
chest  as  if  with  a  sharp  knife.  I  returned  home,  but  said 
nothing  of  the  pain.  The  next  day,  being  also  very  hot, 
and  every  one  busy  in  the  hay-field,  I  thought  I  would  take 
a  rake,  and  work  very  hard  to  produce  perspiration,  in  the 
hope  that  it  might  remove  the  pain ;  but  it  did  not.'  From 
that  time,  a  bad  cough,  with  occasional  loss  of  voice,  gave 
reason  to  suspect  some  organic  injury  of  the  lungs.  Late 
in  the  autumn  of  this  year,  (1805,)  Miss  Smith  accom- 
panied her  mother  and  her  two  younger  sisters  to  Bristol, 
Bath,  and  other  places  in  the  south,  on  visits  to  various 
friends.  Her  health  went  through  various  fluctuations  until 
May  of  the  following  year,  when  she  was  advised  to  try 
Matlock.  Here,  after  spending  three  weeks,  she  grew 
worse ;  and,  as  there  was  no  place  which  she  liked  so  well 
iS  the  Lakes,  it  was  resolved  to  tarn  homewards.  About 
the  beginning  of  June,  she  and  her  mother  returned  alone 
to  Coniston :  one  of  her  sisters  was  now  married ;  her 
three  brothers  were  in  the  army  or  navy  ;  and  her  father 
almost  constantly  with  his  regiment.  Through  the  next 
two  months  she  faded  quietly  away,  sitting  always  in  % 


550 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


tent,"*^  that  had  been  pitched  upon  the  lawn,  and  which 
remained  open  continually  to  receive  the  fanning  of  the  in- 
termitting airs  upon  the  lake,  as  well  as  to  admit  the  bold 
mountain  scenery  to  the  north.  She  lived  nearly  through 
the  first  week  of  August,  dying  on  the  morning  of  August  7  ; 
and  the  circumstances  of  her  last  night  are  thus  recorded 
by  her  mother  :  —  'At  nine  she  went  to  bed.  I  resolved 
to  quit  her  no  more,  and  went  to  prepare  for  the  night. 
Turpin  [Miss  Smith's  maid]  came  to  say  that  Elizabeth 
entreated  I  would  not  stay  in  her  room.  I  replied  —  "  On 
that  one  subject  I  am  resolved  ;  no  power  on  earth  shall 
keep  me  from  her  ;  so,  go  to  bed  yourself."  Accordingly, 
I  returned  to  her  room ;  and,  at  ten,  gave  her  the  usual 
dose  of  laudanum.  After  a  little  time,  she  fell  into  a  doze, 
and,  I  thought  slept  till  one.  She  was  uneasy  and  restless, 
but  never  complained ;  and,  on  my  wiping  the  cold  sweat 
off  her  face,  and  bathing  it  with  camphorated  vinegai, 
which  I  did  very  often  in  the  course  of  the  night,  she 
thanked  me,  smiled,  and  said  — "  That  is  the  greatest 
comfort  I  have.'*  She  slept  again  for  a  short  time  ;  and, 
at  half  past  four,  asked  for  some  chicken  broth,  which  she 
took  perfectly  well.  On  being  told  the  hour,  she  said, 
"  How  long  this  night  is  !  "  She  continued  very  uneasy  ; 
and,  in  half  an  hour  after,  and  on  my  inquiring  if  I  could 
move  the  pillow,  or  do  anything  to  relieve  her,  she  replied, 
There  is  nothing  for  it  but  quiet."  At  six,  she  said, 
"  I  must  get  up  and  have  some  mint  tea."  I  then  called 
for  Turpin,  and  felt  my  angel's  pulse  :  it  was  fluttering  ; 
and  by  that  I  knew  I  should  soon  lose  her.  She  took  the 
tea  well.    Turpin  began  to  put  on  her  clothes,  and  was 

♦  And,  in  allusion  to  this  circtostance,  the  house  afterwards  raise<3 
on  a  neighboring  spot,  at  this  time  suggested  by  Miss  Smith,  received 
the  name  of  Tent  Lodge. 


SOCIETY  OF   THE  LAKES. 


551 


proceeding  to  dress  her,  when  she  laid  her  head  upon  the 
ftiithful  creature's  shoulder,  became  convulsed  in  the  face, 
Bpoko  not,  looked  not,  and  in  ten  minutes  expired.' 

She  was  buried  in  Hawkshead  churchyard,  where  a 
small  tablet  of  white  marble  is  raised  to  her  memory,  on 
which  there  is  the  scantiest  record  that,  for  a  person  so 
eminently  accomplished,  I  have  ever  met  with.  After 
mentioning  her  birth  and  age,  (twenty-nine,)  it  closes 
thus  :  — '  She  possessed  great  talents,  exalted  virtues,  and 
humble  piety.'  Anything  so  unsatisfactory  or  so  com- 
monplace I  have  rarely  known.  As  much,  or  more,  is 
often  said  of  the  most  insipid  people  ;  whereas  Miss  Smith 
was  really  a  most  extraordinary  person.  I  have  conversed 
with  Mrs.  Hannah  More  often  about  her  ;  and  I  never  failed 
to  draw  forth  some  fresh  anecdote  illustrating  the  vast  ex- 
tent of  her  knowledge,  the  simplicity  of  her  character, 
the  gentleness  of  her  manners,  and  her  unaffected  humility. 
She  passed,  it  is  true,  almost  inaudibly  through  life  ;  and 
the  stir  which  was  made  after  her  death  soon  subsided. 
But  the  reason  was  —  that  she  wrote  but  little  !  Had  it 
been  possible  for  the  world  to  measure  her  by  her  powers, 
rather  than  her  performances,  she  would  have  been  placed, 
perhaps,  in  the  estimate  of  posterity,  at  the  head  of  learned 
women  ;  whilst  her  sweet  and  feminine  character  would 
have  rescued  her  from  all  shadow  and  suspicion  of  that 
reproach  which  too  often  settles  upon  the  learned  character 
when  supported  by  female  aspirants. 

The  family  of  Tent  Lodge  continued  to  reside  at 
Coniston  for  many  years ;  and  they  were  connected  with 
the  liake  literary  clan  chiefly  through  the  Lloyds  and  those 
who  visited  the  Lloyds  ;  for  it  is  another  and  striking  proof 
of  the  slight  hold  which  Wordsworth.  &;c.,  had  upon  the 
public  esteem  in  those  days,  that  even  Miss  Smith,  with 
jiU  her  excessive  diffidence  in  judging  of  books  and 


552 


LITEEA^ET  KEMINISCENCES. 


authors,  never  seems,  by  any  one  of  her  letters,  to  have 
t'elt  the  least  interest  about  Wordsworth  or  Coleridge : 
nor  did  Miss  Hamilton,  with  all  her  esprit  de  corps  and  ac- 
quired interest  in  everything  at  all  bearing  upon  literature, 
ever  mention  them  in  those  of  her  letters  which  belong  to 
the  period  of  her  Lake  visit  in  1802  ;  nor,  for  the  six  or 
seven  months  which  she  passed  in  that  country,  and  within 
a  short  morning  ride  of  Grasmere,  did  she  ever  think  it 
worth  her  while  to  seek  an  introduction  to  any  one  of  the 
resident  authors. 

Yet  this  could  not  be  altogether  from  ignorance  that 
such  people  existed  ;  for  Thomas  Wilkinson,  the  intimate 
and  admiring  friend  of  Miss  Smith,  was  also  the  friend  of 
Wordswojth ;  and,  for  some  reason  that  I  never  could 
fathom,  he  was  a  sort  of  pet  with  Wordsworth.  Professor 
Wilson  or  myself  were  never  honored  with  one  line,  one 
allusion  from  his  pen  ;  but  many  a  person  of  particular 
feebleness  has  received  that  honor.  Amongst  these  I 
may  rank  Thomas  Wilkinson  ;  not  that  I  wish  to  speak 
contemptuously  of  him  ;  he  was  a  Quaker,  of  elegant 
habits,  rustic  simplicity,  and  with  tastes,  as  Wordsworth 
affirms,  '  too  pure  to  be  refined.'  His  cottage  was  seated 
not  far  from  the  great  castle  of  the  Lowthers  ;  and,  either 
from  mere  whim  —  as  sometimes  such  wliims  do  possess 
great  ladies  —  whims,  I  mean,  for  drawing  about  them 
odd-looking,  old-world  people,  as  piquant  contrasts  to  the 
fine  gentlemen  of  their  own  society,  or  because  they 
did  really  feel  a  homely  dignity  in  the  plain  speaking 
*  Friend,'  and  liked,  for  a  frolic,  to  be  thoud  and  thee'd  — 
or  some  motive  or  other,  at  any  rate,  they  introduced 
themselves  to  Mr.  Wilkinson's  cottage ;  and  I  believe  that 
the  connection  was  afterwards  improved  by  the  use  they 
found  for  his  services  in  forming  walks  through  the  woods 
of  Lowther,  and  leading  them  in  such  a  circuit  as  to  take 


SOCIETY   OF  THE  LAKKS. 


553 


ttdvantagc  of  all  the  most  picturesque  stations.  As  a  poet, 
I  presume  that  Mr.  Wilkinson  could  hardly  have  recom- 
mended himself  to  the  notice  of  ladies  who  would  naturally 
have  modelled  their  tastes  upon  the  favorites  of  the  age. 
A  poet,  however,  in  a  gentle,  unassuming  way,  he  was  ; 
and  he,  therefore,  is  to  be  added  to  the  corps  litteraire  of 
the  Lakes  ;  and  Yanwath  to  be  put  down  as  the  advanced 
post  of  that  corps  to  the  north. 

Two  families  there  still  remain,  which  I  am  tempted  to 
gather  into  my  group  of  Lake  society  —  notwithstanding 
it  is  true  that  the  two  most  interesting  members  of  the  first 
had  died  a  little  before  the  period  at  which  my  sketch 
commences  ;  and  the  second,  though  highly  intellectual  in 
the  person  of  that  particular  member  whom  I  have  chiefly 
to  commemorate,  was  not,  properly  speaking,  literary ; 
and,  moreover,  belongs  to  a  later  period  ol  my  own 
Westmoreland  experience  —  being,  at  the  time  of  my  set- 
tlement in  Grasmere,  a  girl  at  a  boarding-school.  The 
first  was  the  family  of  the  Sympsons,  whom  Mr.  Words- 
worth has  spoken  of,  with  deep  interest,  more  than  once. 
The  eldest  son,  a  clergyman,  and,  like  Wordsworth,  an 
alumnus  of  Hawkshead  school,  wrote,  amongst  other 
poems,  '  The  Vision  of  Alfred.'  Of  these  poems,  Words- 
worth says,  that  they  '  are  little  known  ;  but  they  contain 
passages  of  splendid  description ;  and  the  versification  of 
his  "  Vision  "  is  harmonious  and  animated.'  This  is  much 
for  Wordsworth  to  say ;  and  he  does  him  even  the  honor 
of  quoting  the  following  illustrative  simile  from  his  de- 
scription of  the  sylphs  in  motion,  (which  sylphs  constitute 
the  machinery  of  his  poem  ;)  and,  probably,  the  reader 
will  be  of  opinion  that  this  passage  justifies  the  praise  of 
Wordsworth.  It  is  founded,  as  he  will  see,  on  the  splen- 
did scenery  of  the  heavens  in  Polar  latitudes,  as  seen  by 
reflection  in  polished  ice  at  midnight. 


554 


LITERAET  KEMINISCENCES, 


•  Less  varying  hues  beneath  the  Pole  adorn 
The  streamy  glories  of  the  Boreal  morn, 
That,  waving  to  and  fro,  their  radiance  shed 
On  Bothnia's  gulf,  with  glassy  ice  overspread  \ 
Where  the  lone  native,  as  he  homeward  glides. 
On  polished  sandals  o'er  the  imprisoned  tides. 
Sees,  at  a  glance,  above  him  and  below. 
Two  rival  heavens  with  equal  splendor  glow  ; 
Stars,  moons,  and  meteors,  ray  oppose  to  ray  ; 
And  solemn  midnight  pours  the  blaze  of  day  ' 

*  He  was  a  man/  says  Wordsworth,  in  conclusion,  •  of 
ardent  feeling ;  and  his  faculties  of  mind,  particularly  his 
memory,  were  extraordinary.*  Brief  notices  of  his  life 
ought  to  find  a  place  in  the  history  of  Westmoreland. 

But  it  was  the  father  of  this  Joseph  Sympson  who  gave 
its  chief  interest  to  the  family.  Him  Wordsworth  has 
described,  at  the  same  time  sketching  his  history,  with  a 
fulness  and  a  circumstantiality  beyond  what  he  has  con- 
ceded to  any  other  of  the  real  personages  in  '  The  Excur- 
sion. '  A  priest  he  was  by  function ; '  but  a  priest  of  that 
class  which  is  now  annually  growing  nearer  to  extinction 
among  us,  not  being  supported  by  any  sympathies  in  thia 

*  His  course. 

Prom  his  youth  up,  and  high  as  manhood's  noon, 

Had  been  irregular  —  I  might  say  wild  ; 

By  books  unsteadied,  by  his  pastoral  care 

Too  little  check'd.    An  active,  ardent  mind  ; 

A  fancy  pregnant  with  resource  and  scheme 

To  cheat  the  sadness  of  a  rainy  day ; 

Hands  apt  for  all  ingenious  arts  and  games  ; 

A  generous  spirit,  and  a  body  strong. 

To  cope  with  stoutest  champions  of  the  bowl— - 

Had  earned  for  him  sure  welcome,  and  the  rights 

Of  a  priz'd  visitant  in  the  jolly  hall 

Of  country  squire,  or  at  the  statelier  board 

Of  Duke  or  Earl  —  from  scenes  of  courtly  pomp 


SOCIETY  OF  THE  LAKES. 


555 


Withdrawn,  to  while  away  the  summer  hours 
In  condescension  amongst  rural  guests. 
With  these  high  comrades  he  had  revelled  long, 
By  hopes  of  coming  patronage  beguiled, 
Till  the  heart  sicken'd.' 

Slowly,  however,  and  indignantly  his  eyes  opened  fully 
vO  the  windy  treachery  of  all  the  promises  held  out  to 
aim ;  and,  at  length,  for  mere  bread,  he  accepted,  from 
an  '  unthought-of  patron,'  a  most  '  secluded  chapelry '  in 
Cumberland.  This  was  *  the  little,  lowly  house  of  prayer* 
of  Wythburn,  elsewhere  celebrated  by  Wordsworth  ;  and, 
for  its  own  sake,  interesting  to  all  travellers,  both  for  its 
deep  privacy,  and  for  the  excessive  humility  of  its  external 
pretensions,  whether  as  to  size  or  ornament.  Were  it  not 
for  its  twin  sister  at  Buttermere,  it  would  be  the  very 
smallest  place  of  worship  in  all  England ;  and  it  looks 
even  smaller  than  it  is,  from  its  position ;  for  it  stands  at 
the  base  of  the  mighty  Helvellyn,  close  to  the  high-road 
between  Ambleside  and  Keswick,  and  within  speaking 
distance  of  the  upper  lake  —  (for  Wythburn  Water, 
though  usually  passed  by  the  traveller  under  the  impres- 
sion of  absolute  unity  in  its  waters,  owing  to  the  inter- 
position of  a  rocky  screen,  is,  in  fact,  composed  of  two 
separate  lakes.)  To  this  miniature  and  most  secluded 
congregation  of  shepherds,  did  the  once  dazzling  parson 
officiate  as  pastor ;  and  it  seems  to  amplify  the  impression 
already  given  of  his  versatility,  that  he  became  a  diligent 
and  niust  fatherly,  though  not  peculiarly  devout,  teachei 
Mnd  friend.  The  temper,  however,  of  the  northern  Dales- 
«ien,  is  not  constitutionally  turned  to  religion ;  conse- 
quently that  part  of  his  defects  did  him  no  especial  injury, 
when  compensated  (as,  in  the  judgment  of  these  Dalesmen, 
it  was  compensated)  by  ready  and  active  kindness,  charity 
the  most  diffusive,  and   patriarchal   hospitality.  Tha 


556 


LITERABY  KEMINISCENCES. 


living,  as  I  hav6  said,  was  in  Wythbiirn ;  but  there  waa 
no  parsonage,  and  no  house  in  this  poor  dale  which  was 
disposable  for  that  purpose.  So  Mr.  Sympson  crossed  the 
marches  of  the  sister  counties,  which  to  him  was  about 
equidistant  from  his  chapel  and  his  house,  into  Grasmere, 
on  the  Westmoreland  side.  There  he  occupied  a  cottage 
by  the  roadside ;  a  situation  which,  doubtless,  gratified  at 
once  his  social  and  his  hospitable  propensities ;  and,  at 
length,  from  age,  as  well  as  from  paternal  character  and 
station,  came  to  be  regarded  as  the  patriarch  of  the  vale. 
Before  I  mention  the  afflictions  which  fell  upon  his  latter 
end,  and  by  way  of  picturesque  contrast  to  his  closing 
scene,  let  me  have  permission  to  cite  Wordsworth's  sketch 
(taken  from  his  own  boyish  remembrance  of  the  case) 
describing  the  first  gipsy-like  entrance  of  the  brilliant 
parson  and  his  household  into  Grasmere  —  so  equally  out 
of  harmony  with  the  decorums  of  his  sacred  character  and 
the  splendors  of  his  past  life :  — 

Rough  and  forbidding  were  the  choicest  roads 
By  which  our  northern  wilds  could  then  be  crossed ; 
And  into  most  of  these  secluded  vales 
Was  no  access  for  wain,  heavy  or  light. 
So  at  his  dwelling-place  the  priest  arriv'd. 
With  store  of  household  goods  in  panniers  slung 
On  sturdy  horses,  graced  with  jingling  bells  ; 
And,  on  the  back  of  more  ignoble  beast, 
That,  with  like  burthen  of  effects  most  priz'd 
Or  easiest  carried,  closed  the  motley  train. 
Young  was  I  then,  a  schoolboy  of  eight  years : 
But  still  methinks  I  see  them  as  they  passed 
In  order  —  drawing  toward  their  wish'd-for-home. 
Rock'd  by  the  motion  of  a  trusty  ass. 
Two  ruddy  children  hang,  a  well-pois'd  freight- 
Each  in  his  basket  nodding  drowsily. 
Their  bonnets,  I  remember,  wreath 'd  with  flowers. 
Which  told  it  was  the  pleasant  month  of  June. 


SOCIETY  OF  THE  LAKES. 


557 


And  close  behind  the  eomely  matron  rode  — 

A  woman  of  soft  speech  and  gracious  smile. 

And  with  a  lady's  mien.  —  From  far  they  came. 

Even  from  Northumbrian  hills  ;  yet  theirs  had  been 

A  merry  journey,  rich  in  pastime,  cheer 'd 

By  music,  pranks,  and  laughter-stirring  jest ; 

And  freak  put  on,  and  arch  word  dropp'd  • —  to  swell 

That  cloud  of  fancy  and  uncouth  surmise 

Which  gathered  round  the  slowly  moving  train. 

*•  Whence  do  they  come  ?  and  with  what  errand  charged  i 

Belong  they  to  the  fortune-telling  tribe 

Who  pitch  their  tents  under  the  greenwood  tree  ? 

Or  strollers  are  they,  fitted  to  enact 

Fair  Rosamond  and  the  Children  of  the  Wood  ? 

When  the  next  village  hears  the  show  announc*d 

By  blast  of  trumpet  ?  "    Plenteous  was  the  growth 

Of  such  conjectures  —  overheard  or  seen 

On  many  a  staring  countenance  portray'd 

Of  boor  or  burgher,  as  they  march 'd  along. 

And  more  than  once  their  steadiness  of  face 

Was  put  to  proof,  and  exercise  supplied 

To  their  inventive  humor,  by  stern  looks. 

And  questions  in  authoritative  tone. 

By  some  staid  guardian  of  the  public  peace. 

Checking  the  sober  horse  on  which  he  rode. 

In  his  suspicious  wisdom  ;  oftener  still 

By  notice  indirect  or  blunt  demand 

From  traveller  halting  in  his  own  despite, 

A  simple  curiosity  to  ease  :  — 

Of  which  adventures,  that  beguil'd  and  cheer'd 

Their  grave  migration,  the  good  pair  would  tell 

With  undiminished  glee  in  hoary  age.* 

Meantime  the  lady  of  the  house  embellished  it  with 
fen.inine  skill ;  and  the  homely  pastor  —  for  such  he  had 
now  become  —  not  having  any  great  weight  of  spiritual 
duties,  busied  himself  in  rural  labors  and  rural  sports. 
But  was  his  mind,  though  bending  submissively  to  his  lot, 
thimged  in  conformity  to  his  task  ?    No  : 


558 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


•  For  he  still 

Ketained  a  flashing  eye,  a  burning  palm, 

A  stirring  foot,  a  head  which  beat  at  nights 

Upon  its  pillow  with  a  thousand  schemes. 

Few  likings  had  he  dropp'd,  few  pleasures  lost ; 

Generous  and  charitable,  prompt  to  serve  ; 

And  still  his  harsher  passions  kept  their  hold  — 

Anger  and  indignation.    Still  he  lov'd 

The  sound  of  titl'd  names,  and  talked  in  glee 

Of  long  past  banquetings  with  high-born  friends : 

Then  from  those  lulling  fits  of  vain  delight 

Uprous'd  by  recollected  injury,  raiPd 

At  their  false  ways  disdainfully  and  oft 

In  bitterness  and  with  a  threatening  eye 

Of  fire,  incens'd  beneath  its  hoary  brow. 

Those  transports,  with  staid  looks  of  pure  good-will. 

And  with  soft  smile  his  consort  would  reprove. 

She,  far  behind  him  in  the  race  of  years. 

Yet  keeping  her  first  mildness,  was  advanced 

Far  nearer,  in  the  habit  of  her  soul, 

To  that  still  region  whither  all  are  bound.* 

Such  was  the  tenor  of  their  lives;  such  the  separate 
character  of  their  manners  and  dispositions ;  and,  with 
unusual  quietness  of  course,  both  were  sailing  placidly  to 
their  final  haven.  Death  had  not  visited  their  happy 
mansion  through  a  space  of  forty  years  —  *  sparing  both 
old  and  young  in  that  abode.'  But  calms  so  deep  are 
ominous  —  immunities  so  profound  are  terrific.  Suddenly 
the  signal  was  given,  and  all  lay  desolate. 

«  Not  twice  had  fall'n 
On  those  high  peaks  the  first  autumnal  snow, 
'      Before  the  greedy  visiting  was  closed. 

And  the  long  privileg'd  house  left  empty;  swept 
As  by  a  plague.    Yet  no  rapacious  plague 
Had  been  among  them;  all  was  gentle  death. 
One  after  one,  with  intervals  of  peace.* 

The  aged  pastor's  wife,  his  son,  one  of  his  daughters 


SOCTETS'  OF  THE  LAKES. 


559 


and  *  a  little  smiling  grandson/  all  had  gone  within  a  hrief 
series  of  days.  These  composed  the  entire  household  in 
Grasmere,  (the  others  having  dispersed,  or  married  away;) 
and  all  were  gone  but  himself,  by  very  many  years  the 
oldest  of  the  whole :  he  still  survived.  And  the  whole 
valley,  nay,  all  the  valleys  round  about,  speculated  with  a 
tender  interest  upon  what  course  the  desolate  old  man 
would  take  for  his  support. 

'  All  gone,  all  vanished  !  he,  deprived  and  bare. 
How  will  he  face  the  remnant  of  his  life  ; 
What  will  become  of  him  ?  we  said,  and  mus'd 
In  sad  conjectures.  —  Shall  we  meet  him  now. 
Haunting  with  rod  and  line  the  crftggy  brooks  ? 
Or  shall  we  overhear  him,  as  we  pass. 
Striving  to  entertain  the  lonely  hours 
With  music  ?  [for  he  had  not  ceas'd  to  touch 
The  harp  or  viol,  which  himself  had  fram'd 
For  their  sweet  purposes,  with  perfect  skill.] 
What  titles  will  he  keep  ?    Will  he  remain 
Musician,  gardener,  builder,  mechanist, 
A  planter,  and  a  rearer  from  the  seed  ?  ' 

Yes ;  he  persevered  in  all  his  pursuits ;  intermitted  none 
of  them ;  weathered  a  winter  in  solitude ;  once  more 
beheld  the  glories  of  a  spring,  and  the  resurrection  of  the 
flowers  upon  the  graves  of  his  beloved  ;  held  out  even 
through  the  depths  of  summer  into  the  cheerful  season  of 
haymaking,  (a  season  much  later  in  Westmoreland  than 
in  the  south)  ;  took  his  rank,  as  heretofore,  amongst  the 
haymakers  ;  sat  down  at  noon  for  a  little  rest  to  his  aged 
limbs,  and  found  even  a  deeper  rest  than  he  was  expect- 
ng  ;  for,  in  a  moment  of  time,  without  a  warning,  without 
a  struggle,  and  without  a  groan,  he  did  indeed  rest  from 
his  labors  for  ever.  He, 

•  With  his  cheerful  throng 
Of  open  projects,  and  his  inward  hoard 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


Of  unsuDLD'd  griefs,  too  many  and  too  keen. 

Was  overcome  by  unexpected  sleep 
In  one  blest  moment.    Like  a  shadow  thrown. 
Softly  and  lightly;  from  a  passing  cloud. 
Death  fell  upon  him,  while  reclined  he  lay 
For  noontide  solace  on  the  summer  grass  — 
The  warm  lap  of  his  mother  earth;  and  so. 
Their  lenient  term  of  separation  pass'd. 

That  family  —  

By  yet  a  higher  privilege  —  once  more 
Were  gathered  to  each  other.' 

Two  surviving  members  of  the  family,  a  son  and  a 
daughter,  I  knew  intimately.  Both  have  been  long  dead ; 
but  the  children  of  the  daughter  —  grandsons,  therefore, 
to  the  patriarch  here  recorded  —  are  living  prosperously, 
and  do  honor  to  the  interesting  family  they  represent. 

The  other  family  were,  if  less  generally  interesting  by 
their  characters  or  accomplishments,  much  more  so  by 
the  circumstances  of  their  position  ;  and  that  member  of 
the  family  with  whom  accident  and  neighborhood  had 
brought  me  especially  connected,  was,  in  her  intellectual 
capacity,  probably  superior  to  most  of  those  whom  I  have 
had  occasion  to  record.  Had  no  misfortunes  settled  upon 
her  life  prematurely,  and  with  the  benefit  of  a  little 
judicious  guidance  to  her  studies,  I  am  of  opinion  that 
she  would  have  been  a  most  distinguished  person.  Her 
situation,  when  I  came  to  know  her,  was  one  of  touching 
interest.  I  will  state  the  circumstances  :  —  She  was  the 
sole  and  illegitimate  daughter  of  a  country  gentleman : 
^nd  was  a  favorite  with  her  father,  as  she  well  deserved 
to  be,  in  a  degree  so  excessive  —  so  nearly  idolatrous  — 
that  I  never  heard  illustrations  of  it  mentioned  but  that 
secretly  I  trembled  for  the  endurance  of  so  perilous  a  love 
under  the  common  accidents  of  life,  and  still  more  under 
;he  unusual  difficulties  and  snares  of  her  peculiar  situation. 


SOCIETY  OF  THE  I.AKES.  561 

Her  father  was,  by  birth,  breeding,  and  property,  a 
Leicestershire  farmer ;  not,  perhaps,  what  you  would 
strictly  call  a  gentleman,  for  he  affected  no  refinements  of 
manner,  but  rather  courted  the  exterior  of  a  bluff,  careless 
yeoman.  Still  he  was  of  that  class  whom  all  people, 
even  then,  on  his  letters,  addressed  as  esquire :  he  had  an 
ample  income,  and  was  surrounded  with  all  the  luxuries 
of  modern  life.  In  early  life  —  and  that  was  the  sole 
palliation  of  hh  guilt  —  (and  yet,  again,  in  another  view, 
aggravated  it)  -  he  had  allowed  himself  to  violate  hia 
own  conscience  in  a  way  which,  from  the  hour  of  his 
error,  never  ceased  to  pursue  him  with  remorse,  and 

which  was,  in  fact,  its  own  avenger.    Mr.  K  was  a 

favorite  specimen  of  English  yeomanly  beauty  :  a  fine 
athletic  figure ;  and  with  features  handsome,  well  moulded, 
frank  and  generous  in  their  expression,  and  in  a  striking 
degree  manly.  In  fact,  he  might  have  sat  for  Robin 
Hood.  It  happened  that  a  young  lady  of  his  own 
neighborhood,  somewhere  near  Mount  Soril  I  think,  fell 
desperately  in  love  with  him.  Oh !  blindness  of  the 
human  heart !  how  deeply  did  she  come  to  rue  the  day 
when  she  first  turned  her  thoughts  to  him  !  At  first, 
iiowever,  her  case  seemed  a  hopeless  one ;  for  she  herself 

was  remarkably  plain,  and  Mr.  K  was  profoundly  in 

love  with  the  very  handsome  daughter  of  a  neighboring 
farmer.  One  advantage,  however,  there  was  on  the  side 
of  this  plain  girl :  she  was  rich  ;  and  part  of  her  wealth 
or  of  her  expectations,  lay  in  landed  property,  that  would 
effect  a  very  tempting  arrondissement  of  an  estate  be- 
longing to  Mr.  K  .    Through  what  course  the  affair 

travelled,  I  never  heard  more   particularly,  than  that 

Mr.  K  was  besieged  and  worried  oat  of  his  steady 

\nind  by  the  solicitations  of  aunts  and  other  relations,  who 
Vad  all  adopted  the  cause  of  the  heiress.    But  whai 
36 


562 


litekary  reminiscences. 


finally  availed  to  extort  a  reluctant  consent  from  him  was, 
the  representation  made  by  the  young  lady's  family,  and 
backed  by  medical  men,  that  she  was  seriously  in  danger 

of  dying,  unless  Mr.  K  would  make  her  his  wife. 

He  was  no  coxcomb;  but,  when  he  heard  all  his  own 
female  relations  calling  him  a  murderer,  and  taxing  him 
with  having,  at  times,  given  some  encouragement  to  the 
unhappy  lovesick  girl,  in  an  evil  hour  he  agreed  to  give 
up  his  own  sweetheart  and  marry  her.  He  did  so.  But 
no  sooner  was  this  fatal  step  taken  than  it  was  repented. 
His  love  returned  in  bitter  excess  for  the  girl  whom  he 
had  forsaken,  and  with  frantic  remorse.  This  girl,  at 
length,  by  the  mere  force  of  his  grief,  he  actually 
persuaded  to  live  with  him  as  his  wife;  and  when,  in 
spite  of  all  concealments,  the  fact  began  to  transpire,  and 
the  angry  wife,  in  order  to  break  off  the  connection, 
obtained  his  consent  to  their  quitting  Leicestershire 
altogether,  and  transferring  their  whole  establishment  to 

the  Lakes,  Mr.  K          evaded  the  whole  object  of  this 

manoeuvre  by  secretly  contriving  to  bring  her  rival  also 
into  Westmoreland.  Her,  however,  he  placed  in  another 
vale  ;  and,  for  some  years,  it  is  pretty  certain  that  Mrs. 

K  never  suspected  the  fact.    Some  said  that  it  was 

her  pride  which  would  not  allow  her  to  seem  conscious  of 
so  great  an  affront  to  herself;  others,  better  skilled  in 
deciphering  the  meaning  of  manners,  steadfastly  affirmed 
that  she  was  in  happy  ignorance  of  an  arrangement  known 
to  all  the  country  beside. 

Years  passed  on  ;  and  the  situation  of  the  poor  wife 
became  more  and  more  gloomy.  During  those  years,  she 
brought  her  husband  no  children ;  on  the  other  hand,  her 

hated  rival  had :  Mr.  K  saw  growing  up  about  hia 

table  two  children,  a  son,  and  then  a  daughter,  who,  Id 
their  childhood,  must  have  been  beautiful  creatures ;  fo^ 


SOCIETY  OF  THE  LAKES. 


563 


the  son,  when  I  knew  him  in  after  life,  though  oloated 
and  disfigured  a  good  deal  by  intemperance,  was  still  a 
very  fine  young  man ;  more  athletic  even  than  his  father ; 
and  presenting  his  father's  handsome  English  yeoman's 
face,  exalted  by  a  Roman  dignity  in  some  of  the  features. 
The  daughter  was  of  the  same  cast  of  person ;  tall,  and 
Roman  also  in  iV.e  style  of  her  face.  In  fact,  the  brother 
and  the  sister  would  have  offered  a  fine  impersonation  of 
Coriolanus  and  Valeria.  This  Roman  bias  of  the  features 
a  little  affected  the  feminine  loveliness  of  the  daughter's 
appearance.  But  still,  as  the  impression  was  not  very 
decided,  she  would  have  been  pronounced  anywhere  a 
very  captivating  young   woman.    These  were  the  two 

crowns  of  Mr.  K  's  felicity,  that  for  seventeen  or 

eighteen  years  made  the  very  glory  of  his  life.  But 
Nemesis  was  on  his  steps  ;  and  one  of  these  very  children 
ehe  framed  the  scourge  which  made  the  day  of  his  death 
a  happy  deliverance,  for  which  he  had  long  hungered  and 
thirsted.  But  I  anticipate.  About  the  time  when  I  came 
to  reside  in  Grasmere,  some  little  affair  of  local  business 

one  night  drew  Wordsworth  up  to  Mr.K  's  house.  It 

was  called,  and  with  great  propriety,  from  the  multitude 
of  holly  trees  that  still  survived  from  ancient  days,  The 

HoUens ;  which  pretty  local  name  Mrs.  K  ,  in  her 

general  spirit  of  vulgar  sentimentality,  had  changed  to 
Holly  Grove. 

The  place,  spite  of  its  slipshod  novelish  name,  which 
might  have  led  one  to  expect  a  corresponding  style  of 
tinsel  finery,  and  a  display  of  childish  purposes,  about 
its  furniture  or  its  arrangements,  was  really  simple  and 
unpretending ;  whilst  its  situation  was,  in  itself,  a  sufficient 
ground  of  interest ;  for  it  stood  on  a  little  terrace  run- 
ning like  an  artificial  gallery  or  corridor,  along  the  final, 
fcnd  all  but  perpendicular,  descent  of  the  mighty  Fair* 


564 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


field.*  It  seemed  as  if  it  must  require  iron  bolts  to  pin  it  to 
the  rock,  which  rose  so  high,  and,  apparently,  so  close  be- 
hind. Not  until  you  reached  the  little  esplanade  upon  which 
the  modest  mansion  stood,  were  you  aware  of  a  little  area 
interposed  between  the  rear  of  the  house  and  the  rock, 
just  sufficient  for  ordinary  domestic  offices.  The  house 
was  otherwise  interesting  to  myself,  from  recalling  one  in 
which  I  had  passed  part  of  my  infancy.  As  in  that,  you 
entered  by  a  rustic  hall,  fitted  up  so  as  to  make  a  beautiful 
little  breakfasting-room :  the  distribution  of  the  passages 
was  pretty  nearly  the  same;  and  there  were  other  resem- 
blances. Mr.  K  received  us  with  civility  and  hospi- 
tality—  checked,  however,  and  embarrassed,  by  a  very 
evident  reserve.  The  reason  of  this  was,  partly,  that  he 
distrusted  the  feelings,  towards  himself,  of  two  scholars; 
but  more,  perhaps,  that  he  had  something  beyond  this 
general  jealousy  for  distrusting  Wordsworth.  He  had 
been  a  very  extensive  planter  of  larches,  which  were  then 
recently  introduced  into  the  Lake  country  ;  and  where,  in 
every  direction,  displacing  the  native  forest  scenery,  and 
dismally  disfiguring  this  most  lovely  region ;  and  this 

*  «  Mighty  Fairfield,* 

And  Mighty  Fairfield,  with  her  chime 
Of  echoes,  still  was  keeping  time. 

Wordsworth's  'Waqgoker.* 
I  have  retained  the  English  name  of  Fairfield ;  but,  when  I  was 
studying  Danish,  I  stumbled  upon  the  true  meaning  of  the  name,  un- 
locked by  that  language;  and  reciprocally  (as  one  amongst  other 
instances  which  I  met  at  the  very  threshold  of  my  studies)  unlocking 
the  fact  that  Danish  (or  Icelandic  rather)  is  the  master-key  to  the 
V)cal  names  and  dialect  of  Westmoreland.  Faar  is  a  sheep  :  fald  a 
hill.  But  are  not  all  the  hills  sheep  hills  ?  No ;  Fairfield  only 
amongst  all  its  neighbors,  has  large,  smooth,  pastoral  savannas,  t^ 
which  the  sheep  resort  when  all  the  rocky  or  barren  neighbors  are 
\efi  desolate. 


SOCIETY  OF  THE  LAKES. 


565 


effect  was  necessarily  in  its  worst  excess  during  the  infancy 
of  the  larch  plantations ;  both  because  they  took  the 
formal  arrangement  of  nursery  grounds,  until  extensive 
thinnings,  as  well  as  storms,  had  begun  to  break  this 
hideous  stiffness  in  the  lines  and  angles,  and  also  because 
the  larch  is  a  mean  tree,  both  in  form  and  coloring,  (having 
a  bright  gosling  glare  in  spring,  a  wet  blanket  hue  in 
autumn,)  as  long  as  it  continues  a  young  tree.  Not  until 
it  has  seen  forty  or  fifty  winters  does  it  begin  to  toss  its 
boughs  about  with  a  wild  Alpine  grace.  Wordsworth, 
for  many  years,  had  systematically  abused  the  larches  and 
the  larch  planters ;  and  there  went  about  the  country  a 
pleasant  anecdote,  in  connection  with  this  well-known 
habit  of  his,  which  I  have  often  heard  repeated  by  the 
woodmen — viz.  that,  one  day,  when  he  believed  himself 
to  be  quite  alone  —  but  was,  in  fact,  surveyed  coolly, 
during  the  whole  process  of  his  passions,  by  a  reposing 
band  of  laborers  in  the  shade,  and  at  their  noontide  meal 
—  Wordsworth,  on  finding  a  whole  cluster  of  birch-trees 
grubbed  up,  and  preparations  making  for  the  installation 
of  larches  in  their  place,  was  seen  advancing  to  the  spot 
with  gathering  wrath  in  his  eyes;  next  he  was  heard 
pouring  out  an  interrupted  litany  of  comminations  and 
maledictions ;  and,  finally,  as  his  eye  rested  upon  the  four 
or  five  larches  which  were  already  beginning  to  '  dress  the 
line '  of  the  new  battalion,  he  seized  his  own  hat  in  a 
transport  of  fury,  and  launched  it  against  the  odious 
intruders.  Mr.  K  had,  doubtless,  heard  of  Words- 
worth's frankness  upon  this  theme,  and  knew  himself  to 
be,  as  respected  Grasmere,  the  sole  offender. 

In  another  way,  also,  he  had  earned  a  few  random  shots 
from  Wordsworth's  wrath  —  viz.  as  the  erector  of  a  huge 
unsightly  barn,  built  solely  for  convenience,  and  so  far 
•iolating  all  the  modesty  of  rustic  proportions,  that  it  was 


566 


LITEBARY  TlEMINISCErCES, 


really  an  eyesore  in  the  valley.  These  considerations, 
and  others  beside,  made  him  reserved  ;  but  he  felt  the 
silent  appeal  to  his  lares  from  the  strangers'  presence,  and 

was  even  kind  in  his  courtesies.    Suddenly,  Mrs.  K  

entered  the  room  —  instantly  his  smile  died  away  :  he  did 
not  even  mention  her  name.  Wordsworth,  however,  she 
knew  slightly  ;  and  to  me  she  introduced  herself.  Mr. 

K  seemed  almost  impatient  when  I  rose  and  presented 

her  with  my  chair.  Anything  that  detained  her  in  the 
room  for  a  needless  moment  seemed  to  him  a  nuisance. 
She,  on  the  other  hand  —  what  was  her  behavior  ?  I 
had  been  told  that  she  worshipped  the  very  ground  on 
which  he  trod ;  and  so,  indeed,  it  appeared.  This  adoring 
love  might,  under  other  circumstances,  have  been  beau- 
tiful to  contemplate  ;  but  here  it  impressed  unmixed  dis- 
gust. Imagine  a  woman  of  very  homely  features,  and 
farther  disfigured  by  a  scorbutic  eruption,  fixing  a  tender 
gaze  upon  a  burly  man  of  forty,  who  showed,  by  every 
word,  look,  gesture,  movement,  that  he  disdained  her.  In 
fact,  nothing  could  be  more  injudicious  than  her  deport- 
ment towards  him.  Everybody  must  feel  that  a  man  who 
hates  any  person,  hates  that  person  the  more  for  troubling 
him  with  expressions  of  love ;  or,  at  least,  it  adds  to 
hatred  the  sting  of  disgust.  That  was  the  fixed  lan- 
guage of  Mr.  K  's  manner,  in  relation  to  his  wife. 

He  was  not  a  man  to  be  pleased  with  foolish  fondling 
endearments,  from  any  woman,  before  strangers ;  but 
from  her !  Faugh  !  he  said  internally,  at  every  instant. 
His  very  eyes  he  averted  from  her  :  not  once  did  he  look 
at  her,  though  forced  into  the  odious  necessity  of  speaking 
to  her  several  times  ;  and,  at  length,  when  she  seemed 
disposed  to  construe  our  presence  as  a  sort  of  brief  priv- 
ilege to  her  own,  he  adopted  that  same  artifice  for  ridding 
himself  of  her  detested  company,  which  has  sometime* 


SOillETT  OF  TffE  LAVES.  667 

done  seasonable  service  to  a  fine  gentleman  when  called 
upon  by  ladies  for  the  explanation  of  a  Greek  word  — 
he  hinted  to  her,  pretty  broadly,  that  the  subject  of  our 
conversation  was  not  altogether  proper  for  female  ears  ; 
very  much  to  the  astonishment  of  Wordsworth  and  my- 
self. 


5G8 


unxABT  BEMiKisexiroxs. 


CHAPTER  XX. 
SOCIETY  OF  THE  LAKES. 


It  was  at  Mr.  Wordsworth's  house  that  I  first  became 
acquainted  with  Professor  (then  Mr.)  Wilson,  of  Elleray. 
I  have  elsewhere  described  the  impression  which  he  made 
upon  me  at  my  first  acquaintance ;  and  it  is  sufficiently 
known,  from  other  accounts  of  Mr.  Wilson,  (as,  for 
example,  that  written  by  Mr.  Lockhart  in  '  Peter's  Let- 
ters,') that  he  divided  his  time  and  the  utmost  sincerity  of 
his  love  between  literature  and  the  stormiest  pleasures  of 
real  life.  Cock-fighting,  wrestling,  pugilistic  contests, 
boat-racing,  horse-racing,  all  enjoyed  Mr.  Wilson's  pat- 
ronage ;  all  were  occasionally  honored  by  his  personal 
participation.  I  mention  this  in  no  unfriendly  spirit  tow- 
ard Professor  Wilson;  on  the  contrary,  these  propensities 
grew  out  of  his  ardent  temperament  and  his  constitutional 
endowments  —  his  strength,  speed,  and  agility :  and  being 
confined  to  the  period  of  youth  —  for  I  am  speaking  of  a 
period  removed  by  five-and-twenty  years  —  can  do  him  no 
dishonor  amongst  the  candid  and  the  judicious.  '  Non 
lusisse  pudety  sed  non  incidera  ludum,^  The  truth  was, 
that  Professor  Wilson  had  in  him,  at  that  period  of  life, 
something  of  the  old  English  chivalric  feeling  which  our 
old  ballad  poetry  agrees  in  ascribing  to  Robin  Hood. 
Several  men  of  genius  have  expressed  to  me,  at  different 
ames,  the  delight  they  had  in  the  traditional  character  of 


PROFESSOB  WILSON. 


569 


Robin  Hood  :  he  has  no  resemblance  to  tbe  old  heroes  of 
Continental  romance  in  one  important  feature  ;  they  are 
uniformly  victorious  :  and  this  gives  even  a  tone  of  mo- 
notony to  the  Continental  poems :  for,  let  them  involve 
their  hero  in  what  dangers  they  may,  the  reader  still  feels 
them  to  be  as  illusory  as  those  which  menace  an  enchanter 
—  an  Astolpho,  for  instance,  who,  by  one  blast  of  his  horn, 
can  dissipate  an  army  of  opponents.  But  Robin  is  fre- 
quently beaten  :  he  never  declines  a  challenge  ;  sometimes 
he  courts  one ;  and  occasionally  he  learns  a  lesson  from 
some  proud  tinker  or  masterful  beggar,  the  moral  of  which 
teaches  him  that  there  are  better  men  in  the  world  than 
himself.  What  follows  ?  Is  the  brave  man  angry  with  his 
stout-hearted  antagonist,  because  he  is  no  less  brave  and  a 
little  stronger  than  himself  ?  Not  at  all ;  he  insists  on 
making  him  a  present,  on  giving  him  a  dejeuner  d  la  four ^ 
chette,  and  (in  case  he  is  disposed  to  take  service  in  the 
forest)  finally  adopts  him  into  his  band  of  archers.  Much 
the  same  spirit  governed,  in  his  earlier  years.  Professor 
Wilson.  And,  though  a  man  of  prudence  cannot  altogether 
approve  of  his  throwing  himself  into  the  convivial  society 
of  gipsies,  tinkers,  potters,*  strolling  players,  &c. ;  never- 
theless, it  tells  altogether  in  favor  of  Professor  Wilson's 
generosity  of  mind,  that  he  was  ever  ready  to  forego  his 
advantages  of  station  and  birth,  and  to  throw  himself 
fearlessly  upon  his  own  native  powers,  as  man  opposed  to 
man.  Even  at  Oxford  he  fought  an  aspiring  shoemaker 
repeatedly,  which  is  creditable  to  both  sides  ;  for  the  very 
prestige  of  the  gown  is  already  overpowering  to  the  artisan 
from  the  beginning,  and  he  is  half  beaten  by  terror  at  his 
own  presumption.    Elsewhere  he  sought  out,  or,  at  least 

*  Potter  is  the  local  term  in  northern  England  for  a  hawker  of 
earthen  ware,  many  of  which  class  lead  a  vagrant  life,  and  encamp 
€uring  the  summer  months  like  gipsies. 


570 


LITERARY  REaMINISCENCES. 


did  not  avoid  the  most  dreaded  of  the  local  heroes  ;  and 
fought  his  way  through  his  '  most  verdant  years/  taking 
or  giving  defiances  to  the  right  and  the  left  in  p'^rfect 
carelessness,  as  chance  or  occasion  offered.  No  man 
could  well  show  more  generosity  in  these  struggles,  nor 
more  magnanimity  in  reporting  their  issue,  which  naturally 
went  many  times  against  him.  But  Mr.  Wilson  neither 
sought  to  disguise  the  issue  nor  showed  himself  at  all 
displeased  with  it :  even  brutal  ill-usage  did  not  seem  to 
have  left  any  vindictive  remembrance  of  itself.  These 
features  of  his  character,  however,  and  these  propensities 
which  naturally  belonged  merely  to  the  transitional  state 
from  boyhood  to  manhood,  would  have  drawn  little  atten- 
tion on  their  own  account,  had  they  not  been  relieved  and 
emphatically  contrasted  by  his  passion  for  literature,  and 
the  fluent  command  which  he  soon  showed  over  a  rich 
and  voluptuous  poetic  diction.  In  everything  Mr.  Wilson 
showed  himself  an  Athenian.  Athenians  were  all  lovers 
of  the  cockpit ;  and,  howsoever  shocking  to  the  sensibilities 
of  modern  refinement,  we  have  no  doubt  that  Plato  was  a 
frequent  better  at  cock-fights  ;  and  Socrates  is  known  to 
have  bred  cocks  himself.  If  there  were  any  Athenian, 
however,  in  particular,  it  was  Alcibiades  ;  for  he  had  his 
marvellous  versatility  ;  and  to  the  Windermere  neigh- 
borhood in  which  he  had  settled,  this  versatility  came 
recommended  by  something  of  the  very  same  position  in 
society  —  the  same  wealth,  the  same  social  temper,  the 
same  jovial  hospitality.  No  person  was  better  fitted  to  win 
or  to  maintain  a  high  place  in  social  esteem ;  for  he  could 
ndapt  himself  to  all  companies  ;  and  the  wish  to  conciliate 
ftnd  to  win  his  way  by  flattering  the  self-love  of  others, 
WSLS  so  predominant  over  all  personal  self-love  and  vanity 

•  That  he  did  in  the  general  bosom  reign 
Of  young  and  old.* 


PROFESSOR  WILSON. 


571 


Mr.  Wilson  and  most  of  his  family  I  had  already  known 
for  six  years.  We  had  projected  journeys  together 
through  Spain  and  Greece,  all  of  which  had  been  nipped 
in  the  bud  by  Napoleon's  furious  and  barbarous  mode  of 
making  war.  It  was  no  joke,  as  it  had  been  in  past  times, 
for  an  Englishman  to  be  found  wandering  in  continental 
regions  ;  the  pretence  that  he  was,  or  might  be,  a  spy  —  a 
charge  so  easy  to  make,  so  impossible  to  throw  off  —  at 
once  sufficed  for  the  hanging  of  the  unhappy  traveller. 
In  one  of  his  Spanish  bulletins.  Napoleon  even  boasted  * 
of  having  hanged  sixteen  Englishmen,  '  merchants  or 
others  of  that  nation,'  whom  he  taxed  with  no  suspicion 
even  of  being  suspected,  beyond  the  simple  fact  of  being 
detected  in  the  act  of  breathing  Spanish  air.  These 
atrocities  had  interrupted  our  continental  schemes ;  and 
we  were  thus  led  the  more  to  roam  amongst  home  scenes. 
How  it  happened  I  know  not  —  for  we  had  wandered 
together  often  in  England  —  but,  by  some  accident,  it  was 
not  until  1814  that  we  visited  Edinburgh  together.  Then 
it  was  that  I  first  saw  Scotland. 

I  remember  a  singular  incident  which  befell  us  on  the 
toad.  Breakfasting  together,  before  starting,  at  Mr. 
Wilson's  place  of  EUeray,  we  had  roamed,  through  a 
long  and  delightful  day,  by  way  of  Ulles water,  &;c. 
Reaching  Penrith  at  night,  we  slept  there  ;  and  in  the 
morning,  as  we  were  sunning  ourselves  in  the  street,  we 
saw,  seated  in  an  arm-chair,  and  dedicating  himself  to  the 
self-same  task  of  apricating  his  jolly  personage,  a  rosy, 
jovial,  portly  man,  having  something  of  the  air  of  a 
Quaker.  Good  nature  was  clearly  his  predominating 
quality  ;  and,  as  that  happened  to  be  our  foible  also,  we 

*  This  brutal  boast  might,  after  all,  be  a  falsehood;  and,  with 
respect  to  mere  numbers,  probably  was  so 


572 


LITERAKY  BEMINISCEXCE8. 


Boon  fell  into  talk  ;  and  from  that  into  reciprocations 
of  good  will  ;  and  from  those  into  a  direct  proposal,  on 
our  new  friend's  part,  that  we  should  set  out  upon  out 
travels  together.  How  —  whither  —  to  what  end  or  object 
—  seemed  as  little  to  enter  into  his  speculations  as  the 
cost  of  realizing  them.  Rare  it  is,  in  this  business  world 
of  ours,  to  find  any  man  in  so  absolute  a  state  of  indiffer- 
ence and  neutrality,  that  for  him  all  quarters  of  the  globe, 
and  all  points  of  the  compass,  are  self-balanced  by 
philosophic  equilibrium  of  choice.  There  seemed  to  us 
.something  amusing  and  yet  monstrous  in  such  a  man  ; 
and,  perhaps,  had  we  been  in  the  same  condition  of 
exquisite  indetermination,  to  this  hour  we  might  all  have 
been  staying  together  at  Penrith.  We,  however,  were 
previously  bound  to  Edinburgh ;  and,  as  soon  as  this  was 
explained  to  him,  that  way  he  proposed  to  accompany 
as.  We  took  a  chaise,  therefore,  jointly,  to  Carlisle  ;  and, 
during  the  whole  eighteen  miles,  he  astonished  us  by  the 
wildest  and  most  frantic  displays  of  erudition,  much  of  it 
levelled  at  Sir  Isaac  Newton.  Much  philosophical  learning 
also  he  exhibited  ;  but  the  grotesque  accompaniment  of 
the  whole  was,  that,  after  every  bravura,  he  fell  back  into 
his  corner  in  fits  of  laughter  at  himself.  W^e  began  to 
find  out  the  unhappy  solution  of  his  indifference  and 
purposeless  condition  ;  he  was  a  lunatic  ;  and,  afterwards, 
we  had  reason  to  suppose  that  he  was  now  a  fugitive  from 
his  keepers.  At  Carlisle  he  became  restless  and  suspi- 
cious ;  and,  finally,  upon  some  real  or  imaginary  business, 
he  turned  aside  to  Whitehaven.  We  were  not  the  objects 
of  his  jealousy  ;  for  he  parted  with  us  reluctantly  and 
anxiously.  On  our  part,  we  felt  our  pleasure  overcast  by 
Badness ;  for  we  had  been  much  amused  by  his  conversa^ 
tion,  and  could  not  but  respect  the  philological  learning 
lirhich  he  had  displayed.    But  one  thing  was  whimsic?) 


PROFESSOR  WILSON. 


673 


enough  :  Wilson  purposely  said  some  startling  things  — . 
startling  in  point  of  decorum,  or  gay  pleasantries,  contr 
honos  mores  ;  at  every  sally  of  which,  he  looked  as  awfully 
shocked  as  though  he  himself  had  not  been  holding  the 
most  licentious  talk  in  another  key,  licentious  as  respected 
all  truth  of  history  or  of  science.  Another  illustration,  in 
fact,  he  furnished  of  what  I  have  so  often  heard  Coleridge 
say  —  that  lunatics,  in  general,  so  far  from  being  the 
brilliant  persons  they  are  thought,  and  having  a  preter- 
natural brightness  of  fancy,  usually  are  the  very  dullest 
and  most  uninspired  of  mortals.  The  sequel  of  our  poor 
friend's  history  —  for  the  apparent  goodness  of  his  nature 
had  interested  us  both  in  his  fortunes,  and  caused  us  to 
inquire  after  him  through  all  probable  channels  —  was, 
that  he  was  last  seen  by  a  Cambridge  man  of  our 
acquaintance,  but  under  circumstances  which  confirmed 
our  worst  fears  :  it  was  in  a  stage-coach ;  and,  at  first, 
the  Cantab  suspected  nothing  amiss ;  but  some  accident 
of  conversation  being  started,  the  topic  of  La  Place's 
Mechanique  Celeste,  off  flew  our  jolly  Penrith  friend  in  a 
tirade  against  Sir  Isaac  Newton ;  so  that  at  once  we 
recognized  him,  as  the  '  Vicar  of  Wakefield,'  his  '  cos- 
mogony friend  '  in  prison  ;  but  —  and  that  was  melancholy 
to  hear  —  this  tirade  was  suddenly  checked,  in  the  rudest 
manner,  by  a  brutal  fellow  in  one  corner  of  the  carriage, 
who,  as  it  now  appeared,  was  attending  him  as  a  regular 
keeper ;  and,  according  to  the  custom  of  such  people, 
always  laid  an  interdict  upon  every  ebullition  of  fancy  or 
animated  thought.  He  was  a  man  whose  mind  had  got 
Bome  wheel  entangled,  or  some  spring  overloaded,  but 
else,  was  a  learned  and  able  person  ;  and  he  was  to  be 
lilent  at  the  bidding  of  a  low,  bruta]  fellow,  incapable  of 
Jistinguishing  between  the  gayeties  of  fancy  and  the 
wandering  of  the  intellect.    Sad  fate  !  and  sad  inversion 


574 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


of  the  natural  relations  between  the  accomplished  scholai 
and  the  rude  illiterate  boor  ! 

Of  Edinburgh  I  thought  to  have  spoken  at  length.  But 
I  pause,  and  retreat  from  the  subject,  when  I  remember 
that  so  many  of  those  whom  I  loved  and  honored  at  that 
time  —  some,  too,  among  the  gayest  of  the  gay  —  are  now 
lying  in  their  graves.  Of  Professor  Wilson's  sisters,  the 
youngest,  at  that  time  a  child  almost,  and  standing  at  the 
very  vestibule  of  womanhood,  is  alone  living  ;  she  has  had 
a  romantic  life ;  has  twice  traversed,  with  no  attendance 
but  her  servants,  the  gloomy  regions  of  the  Caucasus; 
and  once  with  a  young  child  by  her  side.  Her  husband, 
Mr.  M'Neill,  is  now  the  English  Envoy  at  the  court  of 
Teheran.  On  the  rest,  one  of  whom  I  honored  and  loved 
as  a  sister,  the  curtain  has  fallen  ;  and  here,  in  the  present 
mood  of  my  spirits,  I  also  feel  disposed  to  drop  a  curtain 
over  my  subsequent  memoirs.  Farewell,  hallowed  recol- 
lections ! 

Thus,  I  have  sketched  the  condition  of  the  lake  district, 
as  to  society  of  an  intellectual  order,  at  the  time,  (viz. 
the  winter  of  1808-9,)  when  I  became  a  personal  resi- 
dent in  that  district;  and,  indeed,  from  this  era,  through 
a  period  of  about  twenty  years  in  succession,  I  may 
describe  my  domicile  as  being  amongst  the  lakes  and 
mountains  of  Westmoreland.  It  is  true,  I  often  made 
excursions  to  London,  Bath,  and  its  neighborhood,  or 
northwards  to  Edinburgh ;  and,  perhaps,  on  an  average, 
passed  one-fourth  part  of  each  year  at  a  distance  from  this 
district ;  but  here  only  it  was  that  hence  forwards  I  had  a 
Uouse  and  small  establishment.  The  house,  for  a  very 
long  course  of  years,  was  that  same  cottage  in  Grasmere, 
embowered  in  roses  and  jessamine,  which  I  have  already 
described  as  a  spot  hallowed  to  the  admirers  of  Mr 
Wordsworik  \}y  niss  seven  years*  occupation  of  its  pretty 


PROFESSOR  WILSON. 


575 


chambers  and  its  rocky  orchard :  a  little  domain,  which 
Qe  has  himself  apostrophized  as  the  '  lowest  stair  in  that 
magnificent  temple,*  forming  the  north-eastern  boundary 
of  Grasmere.  The  little  orchard  is  rightly  called  '  the 
lowest  stair ;  '  for  within  itself,  all  is  ascending  ground  ; 
hardly  enough  of  flat  area  on  which  to  pitch  a  pavilion, 
and  even  that  scanty  surface  an  inclined  plane  ;  whilst 
the  rest  of  the  valley,  into  which  you  step  immediately 
from  the  garden  gate,  is  (according  to  the  characteristic 
beauty  of  the  northern  English  valleys,  as  first  noticed 
by  Mr.  Wordsworth  himself)  '  flat  as  the  floor  of  a 
temple.* 

In  sketching  the  state  of  the  literary  society  gathered  or 
gathering  about  the  English  lakes,  at  the  time  of  my 
settling  amongst  them,  I  have  of  course  authorized  the 
reader  to  suppose  that  I  personally  mixed  freely  amongst 
the  whole ;  else  I  should  have  had  neither  the  means  for 
describing  that  society  with  truth,  nor  any  motive  for 
attempting  it.  Meantime,  the  direct  object  of  my  own 
residence  at  the  lakes  was  the  society  of  Mr.  Wordsworth. 
A.nd  it  will  be  a  natural  inference  that,  if  I  mingled  on 
familiar  or  friendly  terms  with  this  society,  d  fortiori 
would  Mr.  Wordsworth  do  so,  as  belonging  to  the  lake 
district  by  birth,  and  as  having  been,  in  some  instances, 
my  own  introducer  to  members  of  this  community.  But 
it  was  not  so  ;  and  never  was  a  grosser  blunder  commit 
ted  than  by  Lord  Byron,  when  in  a  letter  to  Mr.  Hogg, 
(from  which  an  extract  is  given  in  some  volume  of  Mr 
Lockhart's  '  Life  of  Sir  Walter  Scott,')  he  speaks  of 
Wordsworth,  Southey,  &c.,in  connection  with  Sir  Walter, 
as  all  alike  injured  by  mixing  only  with  little  adoring 
coteries,  which  each  severally  was  supposed  to  have 
gathered  about  himself  as  a  centre.  Now,  had  this  really 
been  the  case,  I  know  not  how  the  objects  of  such  n 


576 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


partial  or  exclusive  admiration  could  have  been  injured  by 
it  in  any  sense  with  which  the  public  were  concerned. 
A  writer  m^y  —  and  of  that  there  are  many  instances  — - 
write  the  worse  for  meeting  nobody  of  sympathy  with 
himself ;  no  admiration  sufficient  to  convince  him  that  he 
has  written  powerfully  ;  that  misfortune,  when  it  occurs, 
may  injure  a  writer,  or  may  cause  him  to  cease  cultivating 
his  genius.  But  no  man  was  ever  injured  by  the  strong 
reflection  of  his  own  power  in  love  and  admiration  ;  not 
as  a  writer,  I  mean  :  though  it  is  very  true,  from  the  great 
variety  of  modes  in  which  praise,  or  the  indirect  flattery 
of  silent  homage,  acts  upon  different  minds,  that  some 
men  may  be  injured  as  social  companions :  vanity,  and, 
still  more,  egotism —  the  habit  of  making  self  the  central 
point  of  reference,  in  every  treatment  of  every  subject  — 
may  certainly  be  cherished  by  the  idolatry  of  a  private 
circle,  continually  ascending  ;  but  arrogance  and  gloomy 
anti-social  pride  are  qualities  much  more  likely  to  be 
favored  by  sympathy  withheld,  and  the  unjust  denial  of  a 
man's  pretensions.  This,  however,  need  not  be  discussed 
with  any  reference  to  Mr.  Wordsworth ;  for  he  had  no 
such  admiring  circle :  no  applauding  coterie  ever  gathered 
about  him.  Wordsworth  was  not  a  man  to  be  openly 
flattered  ;  his  prid3  repelled  that  kind  of  homage,  or  any 
homage  that  off*ered  itself  with  the  air  of  conferring 
honor  ;  and  repelled  it  in  a  tone  of  loftiness  or  arrogance 
that  never  failed  to  kindle  the  pride  of  the  baffled  flatterer. 
Nothing  in  the  way  of  applause  could  give  Wordsworth 
any  pleasure,  unless  it  were  the  spontaneous  and  half- 
unconscious  utterance  of  delight  in  some  passage  —  the 
implicit  applause  of  love,  half  afraid  to  express  itself;  or 
else  the  deliberate  praise  of  rational  examination,  study, 
and  comparison,  applied  to  his  writings  :  these  were  the 
only  modes  of  admiration  which  could  recommend  them- 


WltLIAM  WOKDSWORTH. 


677 


selves  to  Wordsworth.  But  had  it  been  otherwise,  there 
was  another  mistake  in  what  Lord  Byron  said :  —  the 
neighboring  paople,  in  every  degree,  '  gentle  and  simple,* 
literary  or  half- educated,  who  had  heard  of  Wordsworth, 
agreed  in  despising  him.  Never  had  poet  or  prophet  less 
honor  in  his  own  country.  Of  the  gentry,  very  few  knew 
anything  about  Wordsworth.  Grasmere  was  a  vale  little 
visited  at  that  time,  except  for  an  hour's  admiration.  The 
case  is  now  altered ;  and  partly  by  a  new  road,  which, 
having  pierced  the  valley  by  a  line  carried  along  the 
water's  edge,  at  a  most  preposterous  cost,  and  with  a  large 
arrear  of  debt  for  the  next  generation,  saves  the  labor  of 
surmounting  a  laborious  hill.  The  case  is  now  altered 
no  less  for  the  intellect  of  the  age  ;  and  Rydal  Mount  is 
now  one  of  the  most  honored  abodes  in  the  island.  But, 
at  that  time,  Grasmere  did  not  differ  more  from  the 
Grasmere  of  to-day  than  Wordsworth  from  the  Words- 
worth of  1809-20.  I  repeat  that  he  was  little  known, 
even  as  a  resident  in  the  country  ;  and,  as  a  poet,  strange 
it  would  have  been  had  the  little  town  of  Ambleside 
undertaken  to  judge  for  itself,  and  against  a  tribunal 
which  had  for  a  time  subdued  the  very  temper  of  the  age. 
Lord  Byron  might  have  been  sure  that  nowhere  would 
the  contempt  for  Mr.  Wordsworth  be  rifer  than  exactly 
amongst  those  who  had  a  local  reason  for  curiosity  about 
the  man,  and  who,  of  coui'se,  adopting  the  tone  of  the 
presiding  journals,  adopted  them  with  a  personality  of 
feeling  unknown  elsewhere. 

Except,  therefore,  with  the  Lloyds,  or  occasionally  with 
Thomas  Wilkinson  the  Quaker,  or  very  rarely  with 
Southey,  Wordsworth  had  no  intercourse  at  all  beyond  the 
limits  of  Grasmere  :  and  in  that  valley  I  was  myself,  for 
some  years,  his  sole  visiting  friend  ;  as,  on  the  other  hand, 
my  sole  visitors  as  regarded  that  vale,  were  himself  and 
his  family.  oj 


578 


LITERABY  BEMINISCENCES. 


Among  that  family,  and  standing  fourth  in  the  series  of 
his  children,  was  a  little  girl,  whose  life,  short  as  it  was, 
End  whose  death,  obscure  and  little  heard  of  as  it  was 
amongst  all  the  rest  of  the  world,  connected  themselves 
with  the  records  of  my  own  life  by  ties  of  passion  so 
profound,  by  a  grief  so  frantic,  and  so  memorable  through 
the  injurious  effects  which  it  produced  of  a  physical  kind, 
that,  had  I  left  untouched  every  other  chapter  of  my  own 
experience,  I  should  certainly  have  left  behind  some 
memorandum  of  this,  as  having  a  permanent  interest  in 
the  psychological  history  of  human  nature.  Luckily  the 
facts  are  not  without  a  parallel,  and  in  well  authenticated 
medical  books ;  else  I  should  have  scrupled,  (as  what 
man  does  not  scruple  who  values,  above  all  things,  the 
reputation  for  veracity?)  to  throw  the  whole  stress  of 
credibility  on  my  own  unattached  narration.  But  all 
experienced  physicians  know  well  that  cases  similar  to 
mine,  though  not  common,  occur  at  intervals  in  every 
large  community. 

When  I  first  settled  in  Grasniere,  Catherine  Wordsworth 
•was  in  her  infancy ;  but,  even  at  that  age,  noticed  me 
more  than  any  other  person,  excepting,  of  course,  her 
mother.  She  had  for  an  attendant  a  young  girl,  perhaps 
thirteen  years  old  —  Sarah,  one  of  the  orphan  children 
left  by  the  unfortunate  couple,  George  and  Sarah  Green, 
whose  tragical  end  in  a  snow-storm  I  have  already 
narrated.  This  Sarah  Green  was  as  far  removed  in 
character  as  could  be  imagined  from  that  elder  sister  who 
had  won  so  much  admiration  in  her  childish  days,  by  her 
premature  display  of  energy  and  household  virtues.  She 
was  lazy,  luxurious,  and  sensual :  one,  in  fact,  of  those 
nurses  who,  in  their  anxiety  to  gossip  about  young  men, 
leave  their  infant  or  youthful  charges  to  the  protection  of 
chance.    It  was,  however,  not  in  her  out-of-door  ranir 


KATE  WOKDSWORTH. 


579 


Dlings,  but  at  home,  that  the  accident  occurred  which 
determined  the  fortunes  of  little  Catherine.  Mr.  Coler- 
idge was,  at  that  time,  a  visitor  to  the  Wordsworths  at 
Allan  Bank,  that  house  in  Grasmere  to  which  Wordsworth 
had  removed  upon  quitting  his  cottage.  One  day  about 
noon,  when,  perhaps,  he  was  coming  down  to  breakfast, 
Mr.  Coleridge  passed  Sarah  Green,  playing  after  her 
indolent  fashion  with  the  child ;  and  between  them  lay  a 
number  of  carrots.  He  warned  the  girl  that  raw  carrots 
were  an  indigestible  substance  for  the  stomach  of  an 
infant.  This  warning  was  neglected  :  little  Catherine  ate 
—  it  was  never  known  how  many;  and,  in  a  short  time, 
was  seized  with  strong  convulsions.  I  saw  her  in  this 
state  about  two  p.  m.  No  medical  aid  was  to  be  had 
nearer  than  Ambleside;  about  six  miles  distant.  How- 
ever, all  proper  measures  were  taken ;  and,  by  sunset,  she 
had  so  far  recovered  as  to  be  pronounced  out  of  danger. 
Her  left  side,  however,  left  arm,  and  left  leg,  from  that 
time  forward,  were  in  a  disabled  state :  not  what  could  be 
called  paralyzed,  but  suffering  a  sort  of  atony  or  imperfect 
distribution  of  vital  power.  Catherine  was  not  above 
three  years  old  when  she  died ;  so  that  there  could  not 
have  been  much  room  for  the  expansion  of  her  under- 
Btanding,  or  the  unfoldmg  of  her  real  character.  But 
there  was  room  enough  in  her  short  life,  and  too  much,  for 
love  the  most  frantic  to  settle  upon  her.  The  whole  vale 
of  Grasmere  is  not  large  enough  to  allow  of  any  great 
distances  between  house  and  house ;  and  as  it  happened 
that  little  Kate  Wordsworth  returned  my  love,  she  in  a 
manner  lived  with  me  at  my  solitary  cottage ;  as  often  as 
could  entice  her  from  home,  walked  with  me,  slept  with 
me,  and  was  my  sole  companion.  That  I  was  not  singular 
in  describing  some  witchery  to  the  nature  and  manners  of 
this  innocent  child,  you  may  gather  from  the  following 


580 


IiITEBAKY  REMINISCENCES. 


most  beautiful  lines  extracted  from  a  sketch  *  towards  her 
portraiture,  drawn  by  her  father,  (with  whom,  however^ 
she  was  noways  a  favorite)  :  — 

*  And  as  a  faggot  sparkles  on  the  hearth, 
Not  less  if  unattended  and  alone 
Than  when  both  young  and  old  sit  gather'd  round. 
And  take  delight  in  its  activity ; 
Even  so  this  happy  creature  of  herself 
Was  all  sufficient :  Solitude  to  her 
Was  blithe  society,  who  fiU'd  the  air 
With  gladness  and  involuntary  songs. 
Light  were  her  sallies  as  the  tripping  fawn's. 
Forth  startled  from  the  form  where  she  lay  couch'd ; 
Unthought  of,  unexpected,  as  the  stir 
Of  the  soft  breeze  ruffling  the  meadow  flowers; 
Or  from  before  it  chasing  wantonly 
The  many-color'd  images  impress'd 
Upon  the  bosom  of  a  placid  lake.' 

It  was  this  radiant  spirit  of  joyousness,  making  solitude 
for  her  blithe  society,  and  filling  from  morning  to  night 
the  air  '  with  gladness  and  involuntary  songs,*  this  it  was 
which  so  fascinated  my  heart,  that  I  became  blindly, 
doatingly,  in  a  servile  degree,  devoted  to  this  one  affection. 

*  It  is  entitled  '  Characteristics  of  a  Child  Three  Years  Old ; '  and 
is  dated  at  the  foot  1811,  which  must  be  an  oversight,  for  she  was 
not  so  old  until  the  following  year.  I  may  as  well  add  the  first  six 
lines,  though  I  had  a  reason  for  beginning  the  extract  where  it  does, 
in  order  to  fix  the  attention  upon  the  special  circumstance  which  had 
BO  much  fiiscinated  myself,  of  her  all-sufficiency  to  herself,  and  th€ 
fray  in  which  she  *  filled  the  air  with  gladness  and  involuntary 
iongs. '    The  other  lines  are  these : 

*  Loving  she  is  and  tractable,  though  wild; 
And  Innocence  hath  privilege  in  her 
To  dignify  arch  looks  and  laughing  eyes; 
And  feats  of  cunning;  and  the  pretty  round 
Of  trespasses,  afifected  to  provoke 
Mock  chastisement  and  partnership  in  play.' 


KATE  WORDSWORTH. 


in  tlie  ^ling  of  1812,  I  went  up  to  London;  and,  early 
m  June,  by  a  letter  from  Miss  Wordsworth,  her  aunt,  I 
learned  the  terrific  news,  (for  such  to  me  it  was,)  that  she 
had  died  suddenly.  She  had  gone  to  bed  in  good  health 
about  sunset  on  June  4th;  was  found  speechless  a  little 
before  midnight;  and  died  in  the  early  dawn,  just  as  the 
first  gleams  of  morning  began  to  appear  above  Seat 
Sandel  and  Fairfield,  the  mightiest  of  the  Grasmere 
barriers,  about  an  hour,  perhaps,  before  sunrise.  Never, 
perhaps,  from  the  foundations  of  those  mighty  hills,  was 
there  so  fierce  a  convulsion  of  grief  as  mastered  my 
faculties  on  receiving  that  heart-shattering  news.  Over 
and  above  my  excess  of  love  for  her,  I  had  always  viewed 
her  as  an  impersonation  of  the  dawn  and  the  spirit  of 
infancy;  and  this  abstraction  seated  in  her  person,  to- 
gether with  the  visionary  sort  of  connection,  which,  even 
in  her  parting  hours,  she  assumed  with  the  summer  sun, 
by  timing  her  immersion  into  the  cloud  of  death  with  the 
rising  and  setting  of  that  fountain  of  life  —  these  com- 
bined impressions  recoiled  so  violently  into  a  contrast  or 
polar  antithesis  to  the  image  of  death,  that  each  exalted 
and  brightened  the  other,  I  returned  hastily  to  Grasmere  ; 
stretched  myself  every  night,  for  more  than  two  months 
running,  upon  her  grave ;  in  fact,  often  passed  the  night 
upon  her  grave ;  not  (as  may  readily  be  supposed)  in  any 
parade  of  grief;  on  the  contrary,  in  that  quiet  valley  of 
simple  shepherds,  I  was  secure  enough  from  observation 
until  morning  light  began  to  return ;  but  in  mere  intensity 
Df  sick,  frantic  yearning  after  neighborhood  to  the  darling 
if  my  heart. 

Many  readers  will  have  seen  in  Sir  Walter  Scott's  '  De- 
monology,'  and  in  Dr.  Abercrombie's  *  Inquiries  concern- 
ing the  Intellectual  Powers/  some  remarkable  illustrationi 
of  the  creative  faculties  awakened  in  the  eye  or  othei 


582 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


organs  hy  peculiar  states  of  passion  ;  and  it  is  worthy  e£ 
a  place  amongst  cases  of  that  nature,  that,  in  many  soli- 
tary fields,  at  a  considerable  elevation  above  the  level  of 
the  valleys  —  fields  which,  in  the  local  dialect,  are  called 
'  in  tacks,'  —  my  eye  was  haunted  at  times,  in  broad  noon- 
day, (oftener,  however,  in  the  afternoon,)  with  a  facility, 
but  at  times  also  with  a  necessity,  for  weaving,  out  of  a 
few  simple  elements,  a  perfect  picture  of  little  Kate  in 
the  attitude  and  onward  motion  of  walking.  I  resorted 
constantly  to  these  '  intacks,'  as  places  where  I  was  little 
liable  to  disturbance  ;  and  usually  I  saw  her  at  the  opposite 
side  of  the  field,  which  might  sometimes  be  at  a  distance 
of  a  quarter  of  a  mile,  generally  not  so  much.  Always 
almost  she  carried  a  basket  on  her  head  ;  and  usually  the 
first  hint  upon  which  the  figure  arose  commenced  in  wild 
plants,  such  as  tall  ferns,  or  the  purple  flowers  of  the  fox- 
glove ;  but,  whatever  might  be  the  colors  or  the  forms, 
uniformly  the  same  little  full-formed  figure  arose,  uni- 
formly dressed  in  the  little  blue  bed-gown  and  black  skirt 
of  Westmoreland,  and  uniformly  with  the  air  of  advancing 
motion.  Through  part  of  June,  July,  and  part  of  August, 
in  fact  throughout  the  summer,  this  frenzy  of  grief  con- 
tinued. It  was  reasonably  to  be  expected  that  nature 
would  avenge  such  senseless  self-surrender  to  passion  ; 
for,  in  fact,  so  far  from  making  an  effort  to  resist  it,  I 
clung  to  it  as  a  luxury,  (which,  in  the  midst  of  suffering,  it 
really  was  in  part.)  All  at  once,  on  a  day  at  the  latter 
•ind  of  August,  in  one  instant  of  time,  I  was  seized  with 
«ome  nervous  sensation  that,  for  a  moment,  caused  sick- 
ness. A  glass  of  brandy  removed  the  sickness  ;  but  I 
^It,  to  my  horror,  a  sting  as  it  were,  of  some  stationary 
torment  left  behind  —  a  torment  absolutely  indescribable, 
but  under  which  I  felt  assured  that  life  could  not  be  borne; 
U  is  useless  and  impossible  to  describe  what  followed 


"KkTV.  WORDSWORTH. 


583 


mth  no  apparent  illness  discoverable  to  any  medical 
eye  —  looking,  indeed,  better  than  usual  for  three  months 
and  upwards,  I  was  under  the  possession  of  some  internal 
nervous  malady,  that  made  each  respiration  which  I  drew 
an  act  of  separate  anguish.  I  travelled  southwards  imme- 
diately to  Liverpool,  to  Birmingham,  to  Bristol,  to  Bath, 
for  medical  advice  ;  and  finally  rested  —  in  a  gloomy 
state  of  despair,  rather  because  I  saw  no  use  in  further 
change,  than  that  I  looked  for  any  change  in  this  place 
more  than  others  —  at  Clifton,  near  Bristol.  Here  it  was, 
at  length,  in  the  course  of  November,  that,  in  one  hour, 
my  malady  began  to  leave  me :  it  was  not  quite  so 
abrupt,  however,  in  its  departure,  as  in  its  first  develop- 
ment :  a  peculiar  sensation  arose  from  the  knee  down- 
wards, about  midnight :  it  went  forwards  through  a  space 
of  about  five  hours,  and  then  stopped,  leaving  me  per- 
fectly free  from  every  trace  of  the  awful  malady  which  had 
possessed  me ;  but  so  much  debilitated  as  with  difficulty 
to  stand  or  walk.  Going  down  soon  after  this,  to  Ilfra- 
combe,  in  Devonshire,  where  there  were  hot  sea  baths,  I 
found  it  easy  enough  to  restore  my  shattered  strength. 
But  the  remarkable  fact  in  this  catastrophe  of  my  illness 
is,  that  all  grief  for  little  Kate  Wordsworth,  nay,  all  re- 
membrance of  her,  had,  with  my  malady,  vanished  from 
my  mind.  The  traces  of  her  innocent  features  were 
utterly  washed  away  from  my  heart :  she  might  have 
been  dead  for  a  thousand  years,  so  entirely  abolished  was 
the  last  lingering  image  of  her  face  or  figure.  The  little 
memorials  of  her,  which  her  mother  had  given  to  me,  as 

in  particular,  a  pair  of  her  red  morocco  shoes,  won  not  a 
iigh  from  me  as  I  looked  at  them  :  even  her  little  grassy 

grave,  white  with  snow,  when  1  returned  to  Grasmere  in 

January,  1813,  was  looked  at  almost  with  indiflference  ; 

except,  indeed,  as  now  become  a  memorial  to  me  of  that 


584 


T.ITEHARY  REMINISCENCES. 


dire  internal  physical  convulsion  thence  arising,  by  which 
I  had  been  shaken  and  wrenched  ;  and,  in  short,  a  case 
more  entirely  realizing  the  old  Pagan  superstition  of  a 
nympholepsy  in  the  first  place,  and,  secondly,  of  a  Lethe 
or  river  of  oblivion,  and  the  possibility,  by  one  draught 
from  this  potent  stream,  of  applying  an  everlasting  ablu- 
tion to  all  the  soils  and  stains  of  human  anguish,  I  do  not 
suppose  the  psychological  history  of  man  affords. 

From  the  Lakes,  as  I  have  mentioned  before,  I  went 
annually  southwards  —  chiefly  to  Somersetshire  or  to  Lon- 
don, and  more  rarely  to  Edinburgh.  In  my  Somersetshire 
visits,  I  never  failed  to  see  Mrs.  Hannah  More.  My  own 
relative's  house,  in  fact,  standing  within  one  mile  of  Bar- 
ley Wood,  I  seldom  suffered  a  week  to  pass  without  calling 
to  pay  my  respects.  There  was  a  stronger  motive  to  this 
than  simply  what  arose  from  Mrs.  H.  More's  company,  or 
even  from  that  of  her  sisters,  (one  or  two  of  whom  were 
more  entertaining  because  more  filled  with  animal  spirits 
and  less  thoughtful  than  Mrs.  Hannah  ;)  for  it  rarely  hap- 
pened that  one  called  within  the  privileged  calling  hours, 
w^hich,  with  these  rural  ladies,  ranged  between  twelve 
and  four  o'clock,  but  one  met  some  person  interesting  by 
rank,  station,  political  or  literary  eminence. 

Here,  accordingly,  it  was,  that,  during  one  of  my  last 
visits  to  Somersetshire,  either  in  1813  or  1814,1  met  Mrs. 
Siddons,  whom  I  had  ofteen  seen  upon  the  stage,  but  never 
before  in  private  society.  She  had  come  into  this  part  of 
the  country  chiefly,  I  should  imagine,  with  a  view  to  the 
medical  advice  at  the  Bristol  Hot  Wells  and  Clifton ;  for  it 
happened  that  one  of  her  daughters  —  a  fine  interesting 
young  woman  —  was  suffering  under  pulmonary  con- 
»;umption  —  that  scourge  of  the  British  youth  ;  of  which 
malady,  I  believe,  she  ultimately  died.  From  the  Hot 
Wells,  Mrs.  Siddons  had  been  persuaded  to  honor  with  her 


MRS.  8IBDON8. 


585 


company  a  certain  Dr.  Wh  ,  whose  splendid  villa  of 

Mendip  Lodge  stood  about  two  miles  from  Barley  Wood. 
This  villa,  by  the  way,  was  a  show  place,  in  which  a  vast 
deal  of  money  had  been  sunk,  upon  two  follies  equally 
unproductive  of  pleasure  to  the  beholder  and  of  anything 
approaching  a  pecuniary  compensation  to  the  owner.  The 
villa,  with  its  embellishments,  was  supposed  to  have  cost 
at  least  sixty  thousand  pounds ;  of  which  one-half  had  been 
absorbed,  partly  by  a  contest  with  the  natural  obstacles 
of  the  situation,  and  partly  by  the  frailest  of  all  orna- 
ments —  vast  china  jars,  vases,  and  other  '  knicknackery  * 
baubles,  which  held  their  very  existence  by  so  frail  a 
tenure  as  the  carefulness  of  a  housemaid ;  and  which,  at 
all  events,  if  they  should  survive  the  accidents  of  life, 
never  are  known  to  reproduce  to  the  possessor  one-tenth 
part  of  what  they  have  cost.  Out  of  doors  there  were 
terraces  of  a  mile  long,  one  rising  above  another,  and  car- 
ried, by  mere  artifice  of  mechanic  skill,  along  the  perpen- 
dicular face  of  a  lofty  rock.  Had  they,  when  finished,  any 
particular  beauty  ?  Not  at  all.  Considered  as  a  pleasure 
ground,  they  formed  a  far  less  delightful  landscape,  and  a 
far  less  alluring  haunt  to  rambling  steps,  than  most  of  the 
uncostly  shrubberies  which  were  seen  below,  in  unpre- 
tending situations,  and  upon  the  ordinary  level  of  the 
vale.  What  a  record  of  human  imbecility  !  For  all  his 
pains  and  his  expense  in  forming  this  costly  '  folly,'  his 
eward  was  daily  anxiety,  and  one  solitary  hon  mot  which 
he  used  to  record  of  some  man,  who,  on  being  asked  by 
the  Rev.  Doctor  what  he  thought  of  his  place,  replied, 
liat  '  He  thought  the  Devil  had  tempted  him  up  to  an 
Exceedingly  high  place.'  No  part  of  the  grounds,  nor  the 
house  itself,  was  at  all  the  better  because,  originally,  it 
had  been,  beyond  measure,  difficult  to  form  it :  so  difficult 
that,  according  to  Dr.  Johnson's  witty  remark,  on  another 


586 


LTTERAET  REMINISCENCES. 


occasion,  there  was  good  reason  for  wishing  that  it  had 
been  impossible.  The  owner,  whom  I  knew,  most  cer* 
tainly  never  enjoyed  a  happy  day  in  this  costly  creation  ; 
which,  after  all,  displayed  but  little  taste,  though  a  gor- 
geous array  of  finery.  The  show  part  of  the  house  was 
itself  a  monument  to  the  barrenness  of  invention  in  him 
who  planned  it ;  consisting,  as  it  did,  of  one  long  suite  of 
rooms  in  a  straight  line,  without  variety,  without  obvious 
parts,  and  therefore  without  symmetry  or  proportions. 
This  long  vista  was  so  managed  that,  by  means  of  folding- 
doors,  the  whole  could  be  seen  at  a  glance,  whilst  its 
extent  was  magnified  by  a  vast  mirror  at  the  further  end. 
The  Doctor  was  a  querulous  old  man,  enormously  tall 
and  enormously  bilious  ;  so  that  he  had  a  spectral  appear- 
ance when  pacing  through  the  false  gayeties  of  his  glitter- 
ing villa.  He  was  a  man  of  letters,  and  had  known  Dr. 
Johnson,  whom  he  admired  prodigiously  ;  and  had  himself 
been,  in  earlier  days,  the  author  of  a  poem  now  forgotten. 
He  belonged,  at  one  period,  to  the  coterie  of  Miss  Seward, 
Dr.  Darwin,  Day,  Mr.  Edgeworth,  &;c. ;  consequently  he 
might  have  been  an  agreeable  companion,  having  so  much 
anecdote  at  his  command :  but  his  extreme  biliousness 
made  him  irritable  in  a  painful  degree,  and  impatient  of 
contradiction  —  impatient  even  of  dissent  in  the  most 
moderate  shape.  The  latter  stage  of  his  life  is  worth 
recording,  as  a  melancholy  comment  upon  the  blindness 
of  human  foresight,  and  in  some  degree  also  as  a  lesson 
on  the  disappointments  which  follow  any  departure  from 
high  principle,  and  the  deception  which  seldom  fails  to 
lie  in  ambush  for  the  deceiver.  I  had  one  day  taken  the 
liberty  to  ask  him  why,  and  with  what  ultimate  purpose, 
he  who  did  not  like  trouble  and  anxiety,  had  en:barra3sed 
himself  w'th  the  planning  and  construction  of  a  villa  that 
manifestly  embittered  his  days  ?    '  That  is,  my  young 


MSS.  SIDDONS. 


587 


friend/  replied  the  doctor,  '  speaking  plainly,  you  mean 
to  express  your  wonder  that  I,  so  old  a  man,  (for  he  was 
then  not  far  from  seventy,)  should  spend  my  time  in 
creating  a  show-box.  Well  now,  I  will  tell  you  :  pre- 
cisely because  I  am  old.  I  am  naturally  of  a  gloomy 
turn  ;  and  it  has  always  struck  me,  that  we  English,  who 
are  constitutionally  haunted  by  melancholy,  are  too  apt  to 
encourage  it  by  the  gloomy  air  of  the  mansions  we  inhabit. 
Your  fortunate  age,  my  friend,  can  dispense  with  such 
aids  :  ours  require  continual  influxes  of  pleasure  through 
the  senses,  in  order  to  cheat  the  stealthy  advances  of  old 
age,  and  to  beguile  us  of  our  sadness.  Gayety,  the  riant 
style  in  everything,  that  is  what  we  old  men  need.  And 
I,  who  do  not  love  the  pains  of  creating,  love  the  creation ; 
and,  in  fact,  require  it  as  pai't  of  my  artillery  against 
time.' 

Such  was  the  amount  of  his  explanation  :  and  now,  in 
a  few  words,  for  his  subsequent  history.  Finding  himself 
involved  in  difficulties  by  the  expenses  of  this  villa,  going 
on  concurrently  with  a  large  London  establishment,  he 
looked  out  for  a  good  marriage,  (being  a  widower,)  as 
the  sole  means,  within  his  reach,  for  clearing  off  his 
embarrassments,  without  proportionable  curtailment  of 
his  expenses.  It  happened,  unhappily  for  both  parties, 
that  he  fell  in  with  a  widow  lady,  who  was  cruising  about 
the  world  with  precisely  the  same  views,  and  in  precisely 
the  same  difficulties.  Each  (or  the  friends  of  each)  held 
out  a  false  flag,  magnifying  their  incomes  respectively, 
and  sinking  the  embarrassments.  Mutually  deceived, 
they  married  :  and  one  change  immediately  introduced 
at  the  splendid  villa  was,  the  occupation  of  an  entire 
wing  by  a  lunatic  brother  of  the  lady's  ;  the  care  of 
whom,  with  a  large  allowance,  had  been  committed  to 
Uer  by  the  Court  of  Chancery.    This,  of  itself,  shed  n 


588 


LITESART  REMINISCENCES. 


gloom  over  the  place  which  defeated  the  primary  purpose 
of  the  doctor  (as  explained  by  himself)  in  erecting  it. 
Windows  barred,  maniacal  howls,  gloomy  attendants, 
from  a  lunatic  hospital,  ranging  about :  these  were  sad 
disturbances  to  the  doctor's  rose-leaf  system  of  life. 
This,  however,  if  it  were  a  nuisance,  brought  along  with 
it  some  solatium^  as  the  lawyers  express  it,  in  the  shape 
of  the  Chancery  allowance.  But  next  came  the  load  of 
debts  for  which  there  was  no  solatium^  and  which  turned 
out  to  be  the  only  sort  of  possession  with  which  the  lady 
was  well  endowed.  The  disconsolate  doctor  —  an  old 
man,  and  a  clergyman  of  the  establishment  —  could  not 
resort  to  such  redress  as  a  layman  might  have  adopted  : 
he  was  obliged  to  give  up  all  his  establishments  ;  his  gay 
villa  was  offered  to  Queen  Caroline,  who  would,  perhaps, 
have  bought  it,  but  that  her  final  troubles  in  this  world 
were  also  besetting  her  about  that  very  time.  For  the 
present,  therefore,  the  villa  was  shut  up,  and  '  left  alone 
with  its  glory.*  The  reverend  and  aged  proprietor,  now 
ten  times  more  bilious  and  more  querulous  than  ever, 
shipped  himself  off  for  France  ;  and  there,  in  one  of  the 
southern  provinces  —  so  far,  therefore,  as  climate  was 
concerned,  realizing  his  vision  of  gayety,  but  for  all  else 
the  most  melancholy  of  exiles  —  sick  of  the  world  and 
of  himself,  hating  to  live,  yet  more  intensely  hating  to 
die,  in  a  short  time  the  unhappy  old  man  breathed  his  last, 
in  a  common  lodging  house,  gloomy  and  vulgar,  and  in  all 
things  the  very  antithesis  to  that  splendid  abode  which  he 
had  planned  for  the  consolation  of  his  melancholy,  and  for 
the  gay  beguilement  of  old  age. 

At  this  gentleman's  villa,  Mrs.  Siddons  had  been 
paying  a  visit ;  for  the  doctor  was  a  worshipper,  in  a 
servile  degree,  of  all  things  which  flourished  in  the 
•unshine  of  the  world's  applause.    To  have  been  th* 


MKS.  SIDDONS.  589 

idolized  favorite  of  nations,  to  have  been  an  honored  and 
even  a  privileged  guest  at  Windsor,  that  was  enough 
for  him  ;  and  he  did  his  utmost  to  do  the  honors  of  hia 
neighborhood,  not  less  to  glorify  himself  in  the  eye  of 
the  country,  who  was  fortunate  enough  to  have  such  a 
guest,  than  to  show  his  respect  for  the  distinguished 
visitor.  Mrs.  Siddons  felt  herself  flattered  by  the  worthy 
doctor's  splendid  hospitalities ;  for  that  they  were  really 
splendid,  may  be  judged  by  this  fact,  communicated  to 
me  by  Hannah  More,  viz.  that  the  Bishop  of  London, 
(Porteus,)  when  on  a  visit  to  Barley  Wood,  being  much 
pressed  by  the  doctor  to  visit  him,  had  at  length  accepted 
a  dinner  invitation.  Mrs.  Hannah  More  was,  of  course, 
included  in  the  invitation,  but  had  found  it  impossible  to 
attend,  from  ill  health  ;  and  the  next  morning,  at  break- 
fast, the  bishop  had  assured  her,  that,  in  all  his  London 
experience,  in  that  city  of  magnificent  dinners  beyond  all 
other  cities  of  the  earth,  and  amongst  the  princes  of  the 
land,  he  had  never  witnessed  an  entertainment  so  perfect 
in  its  appointments.  Gratified  as  she  was,  however,  by 
her  host's  homage,  as  expressed  in  his  splendid  style  of 
entertaining,  Mrs.  Siddons  was  evidently  more  happy  in 
her  residence  at  Barley  Wood.  The  style  of  conversa- 
tion pleased  her.  It  was  religious  :  but  Mrs.  Siddons  was 
herself  religious  ;  and  at  that  moment,  when  waiting  with 
anxiety  upon  a  daughter  whose  languor  seemed  but  too 
ominous  in  her  maternal  eyes,  she  was  more  than  usually 

♦  *  A  privileged  guest  at  Windsor.  Mrs.  Siddons  used  to  men* 
tion,  that  when  she  was  invited  to  Windsor  Castle,  for  the  purpose 
of  reading  before  the  Queen  and  her  royal  daughters,  on  her  first 
visit,  she  was  ready  to  sink  from  weariness  under  the  effort  of  stand- 
ing for  so  long  a  time;  but  on  some  subsequent  visit,  I  have  under* 
•tood  that  she  was  allowed  to  sit,  probably  on  the  suggestion  of  one 
»f  the  younger  ladierl. 


590 


LITEBARY  REMINISCENCES. 


open  to  religious  impressions,  and  predisposed  to  religious 
topics. 

Certain  I  am,  however,  from  what  I  then  observed, 
that  Mrs.  Siddons,  in  common  with  many  women  of 
rank  who  were  on  the  list  of  the  Barley  Wood  visitors, 
did  not  apprehend,  in  their  full  sense  and  severity,  the 
peculiar  principles  of  Hannah  More.  This  lady,  excel- 
lent as  she  was,  and  incapable  of  practising  any  studied 
deceit,  had,  however,  an  instinct  of  worldly  wisdom, 
which  taught  her  to  refrain  from  shocking  ears  polite  with 
too  harsh  or  too  broad  an  exposure  of  all  which  she 
believed.  This,  at  least,  if  it  were  any  duty  of  hers,  she 
considered,  perhaps,  as  already  fulfilled  by  her  writings  ; 
and,  moreover,  the  very  tone  of  good  breeding,  which 
she  had  derived  from  the  good  company  she  had  kept, 
made  her  feel  the  impropriety  of  lecturing  her  visitors 
even  when  she  must  have  thought  them  in  error.  Mrs. 
Siddons  obviously  thought  Hannah  More  a  person  who 
differed  from  the  world  chiefly  by  applying  a  greater 
energy,  and  sincerity,  and  zeal,  to  a  system  of  religious 
truth  equally  known  to  all.  Repentance,  for  instance  — 
all  people  hold  that  to  be  a  duty  ;  and  Mrs.  Hannah  More 
differed  from  them  only  by  holding  it  to  be  a  duty  of  all 
hours,  a  duty  for  youth  not  less  than  for  age.  But  how 
much  would  she  have  been  shocked  to  hear  that  Mrs. 
Hannah  More  held  all  repentance,  however  indispensable, 
yet  in  itself,  and  though  followed  by  the  sincerest  efforts 
at  reformation  of  life,  to  be  utterly  unavailing  as  any 
operative  part  of  the  means  by  which  man  gains  accept- 
ance with  God.  To  rely  upon  repentance,  or  upon  any- 
thing that  man  can  do  for  himself,  that  Mrs.  Hannah 
More  considered  as  the  mortal  taint,  as  the  tiqwtov  WtvSoi 
•n  the  worldly  theories  of  the  Christian  scheme  ;  and 
oave  heard  the  two  ladies  —  Mrs  More  and  Mrs.  Siddons 


MBS.  SIDD0N8. 


fi9l 


I  mean  —  talking  by  tlie  hour  together,  as  completely  at 
cross  purposes  as  it  is  possible  to  imagine.  Everything 
in  fact  of  what  was  special  in  the  creed  adopted  by  Mrs. 
Hannah  More,  by  Wilberforce,  and  many  others  known 
as  evangelical  Christians,  is  always  capable,  in  lax  con- 
versation, of  being  translated  into  a  vague  general  sense, 
which  completely  obscures  the  true  limitations  of  the 
meaning. 

Mrs.  Hannah  More,  however,  was  too  polished  a  woman 
to  allow  of  any  sectarian  movement  being  impressed  upon 
the  conversation;  consequently,  she  soon  directed  it  to 
literature,  upon  which  Mrs.  Siddons  was  very  amusing, 
from  her  recollections  of  Dr.  Johnson,  whose  fine-turned 
compliment  to  herself,  (so  much  in  the  spirit  of  those 
unique  compliments  addressed  to  eminent  people  by 
Louis  XIV.)  had  for  ever  planted  the  Doctor's  memory 
in  her  heart.  She  spoke  also  of  Garrick  and  of  Mrs. 
Garrick ;  but  not,  I  think,  with  so  much  respect  and 
affection  as  Mrs.  Hannah  More,  who  had,  in  her  youthful 
days,  received  the  most  friendly  attentions  from  both, 
though  coming  forward  at  that  time  in  no  higher  char- 
acter than  as  the  author  of  Percy,  the  most  insipid  of 
tragedies.  Mrs.  Siddons  was  prevailed  on  to  read  pas- 
sages from  both  Shakspeare  and  Milton.  The  dramatic 
readings  were  delightful ;  in  fact,  they  were  almost  stage 
retoarsals,  accompanied  with  appropriate  gesticulation. 
One  was  the  great  somnambulist  scene  in  Macbeth,  which 
was  the  ne  plus  ultra  in  the  whole  range  of  Mrs.  Siddons' s 
scenical  exhibitions,  and  can  never  be  forgotten  by  any 
man  who  once  had  the  happiness  to  witness  that  immortal 
performance  of  the  divine  artist.  Another,  given  at  the 
request  of  a  Dutch  lady,  residing  in  the  neighborhood  of 
Barley  Wood,  was  the  scene  from  King  John,  of  the  Lady 
Constance,  beginning  — '  Gone  to  be  married !  gone  to 


692 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


swear  a  peace  ! '  &c.  The  last,  and  truly  superb  for  the 
musical  intonation  of  the  cadences,  was  that  inimitable 
apology  or  pleading  of  Christian  charity  for  Cardinal 
Wolsey,  addressed  to  his  bitterest  enemy.  Queen  Cathe- 
rine. All  these,  in  different  degrees  and  different  ways, 
were  exquisite.  But  the  readings  from  Milton  were  not 
to  my  taste.  And,  some  weeks  after,  when,  at  Mrs. 
Hannah  More's  request,  I  had  read  to  her  some  of  Lord 
Byron's  most  popular  works,  I  got  her  to  acknowledge,  in 
then  speaking  upon  the  subject  of  reading,  that  perhaps 
the  style  of  Mrs.  Siddons's  reading  had  been  too  much 
determined  to  the  dramatic  cast  of  emphasis,  and  the 
pointed  expression  of  character  and  situation  which  must 
always  belong  to  a  speaker  bearing  a  part  in  a  dialogue, 
to  admit  of  her  assuming  the  tone  of  a  rapt  poetic  inspi- 
ration. 

Meantime,  whatever  she  did  —  whether  it  were  in 
display  of  her  own  matchless  talents,  but  always  at  the 
earnest  request  of  the  company  or  of  her  hostess  —  or 
whether  it  were  in  gentle  acquiescent  attention  to  the 
display  made  by  others  —  or  whether  it  were  as  one 
member  of  a  general  party,  taking  her  part  occasionally, 
for  the  amusement  of  the  rest,  and  contributing  to  the 
general  fund  of  social  pleasure  —  nothing  could  exceed 
the  amiable,  kind,  and  unassuming  deportment  of  Mrs. 
Siddons.  She  had  retired  from  the  stage,*  and  no  longer 
regarded  herself  as  a  public  character.    But  so  much  the 

*  I  saw  her,  however,  myself  upon  the  stage  twice  after  this  meet- 
ting  at  Barley  Wood;  it  was  at  Edinburgh;  and  the  parts  were 
those  of  Lady  Macbeth  and  Lady  Randolph.  But  she  then  performed 
only  as  an  expression  of  kindness  to  her  grandchildren.  Professor 
Wilson  and  myself  saw  her  on  the  occasion  from  the  stage-box,  witb 
a  delight  embittered  by  the  certainty  that  we  saw  her  for  the  last 


MRS.  8IDD0NS. 


593 


stronger  did  she  seem  to  think  the  claims  of  her  frienda 
upon  anything  she  could  do  for  their  amusement. 

Meantime,  amongst  the  many  pleasurable  impressions 
which  Mrs.  Siddons's  presence  never  failed  to  make, 
there  was  one  which  was  positively  painful  and  humilat* 
ing  :  it  was  the  degradation  which  it  inflicted  upon  other 
women.  One  day  there  was  a  large  dinner  party  at  Barley 
Wood  —  Mrs.  Siddons  was  present ;  and  I  remarked  to 
a  gentleman  who  sat  next  to  me  —  a  remark  which  he 
heartily  confirmed  —  that  upon  rising  to  let  the  ladies 
leave  us,  Mrs.  Siddons,  by  the  mere  necessity  of  her  regal 
deportment  dwarfed  the  whole  party,  and  made  them  look 
ridiculous  ;  though  Mrs.  H.  More,  and  others  of  the  ladies 
present,  were  otherwise  really  women  of  very  pleasing 
appearance. 

One  final  remark  is  forced  upon  me  by  my  recollec- 
tions of  Mrs.  Jordan,  and  of  her  most  unhappy  end  ;  it  is 
this ;  and  strange  enough  it  seems  :  —  That  the  child  of 
laughter  and  comic  mirth,  whose  laugh  itself  thrilled  the 
heart  with  pleasure,  and  who  created  gayety  of  the 
noblest  order  for  one  entire  generation  of  her  country- 
men, died  prematurely,  and  in  exile,  and  in  affliction, 
which  really  killed  her  by  its  own  stings.  If  ever  woman 
died  of  a  broken  heart,  of  tenderness  bereaved,  and  of 
hope  deferred,  that  woman  was  Mrs.  Jordan.  On  the 
other  hand,  this  sad  votary  of  Melpomene,  the  queen  of 
the  tragic  stage,  died,  full  of  years  and  honors,  in  the 
bosom  of  her  admiring  country,  in  the  centre  of  idolizing 
friends,  and  happy  in  all  things  except  this,  that  some  of 
those  whom  she  most  loved  on  earth  had  gone  before  her 
Strange  contrariety  of  lots  for  the  two  transcendent 
daughters  of  the  comic  and  tragic  muse.  For  my  own 
part,  I  shall  always  regard  my  recollections  of  Mr?. 

38 


594  LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 

Siddons  as  those  in  whicli  chiefly  I  have  an  advantage 
over  the  coming  generation ;  nay,  perhaps  over  ali 
generations ;  for  many  centuries  may  revolve  without 
producing  such  another  transcendent  creature. 


WALKING  SIEWA&T* 


595 


CHAPTER  XXL 


WALKING  STEWART.  — EDWARD  IRVING.  —  WILLIAM 
WORDSWORTH. 


In  London,  for  a  space  of  fifteen  or  twenty  years,  the 
most  interesting  by  far  of  all  my  friends,  and,  singly,  a 
Bufficient  magnet  to  draw  me  in  that  direction,  sometimes 
when  I  had  no  other  motive  for  such  a  journey,  was  the 
celebrated  Peripatetic,  John  Stewart,  commonly  called 
'Walking  Stewart.'  This  man  was  indeed,  in  many 
respects,  a  more  interesting  person  than  any  I  have 
known,  amongst  those  distinguished  by  accomplishments 
of  the  same  kind.  He  was  by  birth  a  Scotsman :  but  it 
was  little  indeed  that  he  owed  to  the  land  of  his  nativity ; 
for  he  had  been  early  turned  adrift,  and  thrown  altogether 
upon  his  own  resources.  At  school,  as  he  often  told  me 
with  high  glee,  and  even  with  something  of  gratified 
vanity  in  the  avowal,  no  boy  except  himself  was  consid- 
ered an  invincible  dunce,  or  what  is  sometimes  called  a 
Bergen-op-zoom ;  that  is,  a  head  impregnable  to  all 
teaching  and  all  impressions  that  could  be  conveyed 
through  books.  Erudition,  in  fact,  and  classical  or  philo- 
logical learning  of  every  kind,  he  thoroughly  despised ; 
nor  could  he  have  been  won  by  kindness  even  to  take 
an  interest  in  studies  from  which  his  mind  naturally 
revolted;  and  thus,  like  many  a  boy  before  him,  he 
obtained  the  reputation  of  a  dunce,  merely  because  hia 


596 


LITEBART  REMINISCENCES 


powers  were  never  called  into  action  or  tried  amongst 
tasks  in  which  he  took  any  genial  delight.  Yet  this  same 
scoffing-stock  of  the  school,  when  summoned  away  to  the 
tasks  of  life,  dealing  with  subjects  that  interested  hia 
feelings,  and  moving  in  an  element  for  which  his  natural 
powers  had  qualified  him,  displayed  the  energetic  origi- 
nality  of  genius.  He  went  out  to  Bengal  as  a  servant 
of  the  Company,  in  a  civil  capacity,  and,  for  some  time, 
was  viewed  both  as  an  aspiring  young  man  and  as  a 
young  man  of  great  promise :  but,  suddenly,  some  strong 
scruples  of  conscience  seized  him,  with  regard  to  the  ten* 
ure  of  the  Company's  Indian  empire,  and  to  the  mode 
m  which  it  was  administered.  Simply  upon  the  impulse 
of  these  scruples,  doubtless  ill-founded,  he  quitted  the 
Company's  service,  and  entered  that  of  a  native  prince  — 
1  think  the  Nawaub  of  Arcot :  him  he  served  in  the  office 
of  secretary.  And,  finally,  quitting  this  service  also, 
chiefly,  I  conjecture,  because  the  instinct  of  migration 
and  of  rambling  was  strong  upon  him,  he  commenced 
that  long  course  of  pedestrian  travelling  which  thence- 
forwards  occupied  the  active  years  of  his  life  :  in  fact, 
from  perhaps  the  age  of  twenty-three  to  fifty-eight  or 
sixty.  A  navigator  who  has  accomplished  the  periplus 
{TTBQtTiXsg)  of  the  globe,  we  call  a  circumnavigator;  and, 
by  parity  of  reason,  we  might  call  a  man  in  the  circum- 
stances of  Mr.  Stewart,  viz.  one  who  has  walked  round 
the  terra  Jirma  of  the  globe,  from  Kamtschatka  to 
Paraguay,  and  from  Paraguay  to  Lapland,  a  circum- 
peripatetic^  (or,  if  the  reader  objects  to  this  sort  of  tau- 
tology in  the  circum  and  the  peri,  a  circumnamhulator,) 
A  terrestrial  globe,  representing  the  infinite  wanderings 
of  Mr.  Stewart,  would  have  seemed  belted  and  zoned  in 
all  latitudes,  like  a  Ptolemaic  globe  of  the  heavens,  with 
cycles  and  epicycles,  approaching,  crossing,  traversing 


WALKING  STEWART. 


597 


coinciding,  receding.  No  region,  pervious  to  human  feet 
except,  I  think,  China  and  Japan,  but  had  been  visited 
by  Mr.  Stewart  in  this  philosophic  style ;  a  style  which 
compels  a  man  to  move  slowly  through  a  country,  and  to 
fall  in  continually  with  the  natives  of  that  country  in  a 
degree  far  beyond  what  is  possible  for  the  traveller  in 
carriages  and  palanquins,"^'  or  mounted  on  horses,  mules, 
or  camels. 

It  may  be  presumed  of  any  man  who  has  travelled  so 
extensively,  and  has  thrown  himself  so  fearlessly,  for  five 
or  eight  and  thirty  years,  amongst  men  of  all  nations  and 
in  all  degrees  of  civilization,  that  he  must  often  have 
found  himself  in  situations  of  great  and  sudden  danger. 
In  fact,  Walking  Stewart,  like  the  famous  Ledyard,  used 
to  look  back  upon  the  hardships,  the  sufferings,  and  the 
risks  he  had  undergone,  as  too  romantic  for  rehearsal. 
People  would  imagine,  as  he  thought,  that  he  was  using 
the  traveller's  immemorial  privilege  of  embellishing ; 
and  accordingly,  as  one  foremost  feature  in  the  character 
of  John  Stewart,  was  his  noble  reverence  for  truth,  so 
that,  to  have  won  a  universal  interest  with  the  public,  he 
would  not  have  deviated,  by  one  hair's  breadth,  from  the 
severe  facts  of  a  case  ;  for  that  reason  it  was  rare  that  he 
would  be  persuaded  to  relate  any  part  of  his  adventures 
which  approached  the  marvellous.  Being  so  sincerely 
and  profoundly  veracious,  he  was  jealous  even  of  being 
inspected  to  be  otherwise,  though  it  were  in  a  trifling 
question,  or  by  a  shadow  of  exaggeration.  Yet,  unwilling 
as  he  was  to  report  his  own  adventurous  hazards,  or  the 
escapes  which,  doubtless,  he    often  owed  to  his  own 

*  Dawk-travelling  in  a  palanquin  has  been  so  much  improved  of 
late  throughout  India,  that  ninety  miles  a  day  may  be  accomplished 
in  favorable  weather;  and,  if  the  bearers  are  laid  carefully,  one 
hundred.    With  thi«  velocity,  and  this  seclusion,  httle  can  be  se«n. 


598 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


address,  courage,  or  presence  of  mind,  one  general 
remark  I  have  often  heard  him  make,  and  with  great 
energy ;  a  remark  abstracted  from  all  his  dangers  collec- 
tively, though  he  would  not  refer  to  them  separately  and 
individually  :  it  is  a  remark  which  ought  to  be  put  on 
record  for  the  honor  of  human  nature ;  and  it  should  be 
viewed  in  the  light  of  a  testimony  given  by  a  witness, 
whose  opportunities  for  collecting  a  fair  evidence  must  far 
have  exceeded  those  of  all  other  men,  making  no  excep- 
tion in  favor  of  any  nation  or  any  century.  His  remark 
was  this  —  that,  although  in  barbarous  countries,  with  no 
police  or  organized  provisions  whatsoever,  for  the  protec- 
tion of  human  life  and  property,  many  violent  and 
licentious  aggressions  would,  doubtless,  be  committed, 
under  circumstances  of  temptation  or  of  provocation, 
upon  the  weak  or  defenceless  stranger ;  yet  that,  in  the 
whole  course  of  his  experience,  he  had  never  known  one 
case  where  the  rudest  savage  of  the  wildest  tribes  had 
violated  an  understood  trust  reposed  in  his  forbearance. 
It  was  generally  supposed,  he  said,  that  the  civilized 
traveller  amongst  savages  might  lay  his  account  with 
meeting  unprovoked  violence,  except  in  so  far  as  he 
carried  arms  for  his  protection.  Now,  he  had  found  it 
by  much  the  safer  plan  to  carry  no  arms.  That  he  had 
never  found,  and  did  not  believe  that  in  travels  ten  times 
more  extensive  he  ever  should  have  found,  a  human 
being  so  base  as  to  refuse  (provided  he  could  be  made 
clearly  to  understand)  the  appeal  made  to  his  generosity 
by  a  fellow-being,  in  boldly  throwing  himself  upon  his 
justice  or  hospitality ;  and  if  a  different  creed  prevailed 
often  amongst  nautical  people,  it  was  owing  (he  con- 
tended) to  the  extreme  levity  and  thoughtlessness  of 
Bailors.  Indeed,  the  records  of  voyages,  and,  very 
-ecently,  the  records  of  our  new  settlements  in  Australia 


WALItlNU  STEWART. 


599 


teem  with  instances  where  feuds,  through  a  whole  genera- 
tion, (wanton  and  causeless  as  they  may  seem  to  many  of 
those  who  merely  inherit  the  consequences.)  have  been 
originally  provoked  by  a  cruel  or  cowardly  salutation 
from  fire-arms  to  a  party  of  natives,  advancing,  perhaps, 
in  a  tumultuous  manner,  alarming  to  the  timid  or  the 
inexperienced,  but  with  intentions  perfectly  pacific. 

Walking  Stewart  was,  in  conversation,  the  most  elo- 
quent man  —  limiting  the  meaning  to  the  eloquence  of 
nature,  unsustained  by  any  range  of  illustration  from 
books  —  that  I  have  ever  known.  Nor  was  I  singular  in 
this  opinion  ;  for  Mr.  Wordsworth,  the  poet,  said  some- 
thing to  the  same  effect,  in  speaking  of  the  political 
harangues  which  he  was  in  the  habit  of  making  about 
the  time  of  the  French  Revolution.  And  little  as  he 
occupied  himself  with  books  as  a  reader,  by  a  strange 
inversion  of  the  ordinary  human  relations  to  literature,  he 
—  this  rare  and  slight  reader  —  was  largely  connected 
with  books  as  an  author.  Apparently,  he  read  little  or 
nothing  but  what  he  wrote  himself ;  books  treating  of 
man,  his  nature,  his  expectations,  and  his  duties,  in  a 
desultory  style  ;  mingling  much  profound  philosophy  with 
many  absurd  or  whimsical  theories  of  physiology,  or 
equally  chimerical  hypotheses  of  health  and  the  modes  of 
preserving  it.  Animal  food  or  wine  he  never  allowed 
himself  to  use  ;  or,  in  fact,  anything  but  the  Brahminical 
diet  of  milk,  fruit,  and  bread.  It  is  saying  little  in  favor 
of  his  system,  to  mention  that  he,  in  his  own  person, 
enjoyed  a  cloudless  health  ;  for  so  he  would  have  done 
under  any  diet,  with  the  same  quantity  of  bodily  exercise, 
and  enjoying  the  same  origina?  hardness  of  constitution 
and  athletic  frame  of  body.  Latterly,  his  sole  pleasure 
was  music  ;  and  it  gieved  me  to  find,  therefore,  towards 
the  close  of  his  life,  that  he  was  growing  exceedingly 


fiOO  LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 

Jeaf :  out  this  defect  of  hearing  he  remedied  partially  by 
purchasing  an  organ  of  considerable  size  and  power. 

Walking  Stewart  had  purchased,  in  his  younger  days, 
an  annuity,  which,  in  fact,  for  many  years,  constituted  his 
sole  dependence.  The  tables  of  mortality  were  very 
imperfect  at  that  time,  and  the  Insurance  Offices  made 
many  losing  contracts  ;  amongst  which  was  Mr.  Stewart's. 
He  had  long  been  viewed  by  the  office  as  one  of  their 
bad  bargains  ;  and  he  had  a  playful  malice  in  presenting 
himself  annually  to  establish  his  continued  existence. 
The  office  was  always  in  a  roar  of  laughter  when  he 
made  his  entry  :  for  the  Directors  protested  that  he  had 
already  lived  too  long  fey  twenty  years  for  their  interest ; 
and  he,  on  his  part,  ascribing  his  robust  health  to  his 
peculiar  diet,  threatened  them  with  living  at  least  twenty 
years  longer.  He  did,  certainly,  wear  all  the  promise  of 
doing  so  ;  for  his  eye  was  as  brilliant  and  his  cheek  as 
fresh  as  those  of  men  forty  years  younger.  But  he  did 
not  quite  redeem  the  pledges  of  his  appearance.  A  few 
years  before  his  death,  he  gained  an  important  suit 
against  the  East  India  Company.  How  that  should  have 
hastened  his  death,  I  cannot  conjecture  ;  for  so  thoroughly 
had  his  simple  diet  become  necessary  to  his  comfort,  and 
a  matter  of  cordial  preference,  that  no  entreaties  of  a 
friend  would  persuade  him  to  take  a  glass  of  wine  or 
spirits.  A  man  more  temperate  never  existed,  nor  a  man 
in  all  respects  of  more  philosophic  habits,  or  more  entire 
independence.  I  and  others,  who  would  not  have  insulted 
him  with  the  offer  of  money,  yet,  knowing  at  one  time 
the  extreme  slenderness  of  his  resources,  attempted  to 
send  him  books  and  a  few  other  luxuries,  by  way  of 
relieving  the  weariness  (as  we  feared)  of  his  long  soli- 
tary evenings  in  the  heart  of  tumultuous  London.  But, 
thougli  taking  our  attentions  kindly,  he  uniformly  repelled 


WALKING  STEWART. 


601 


them  ;  nor  ever^  in  one  instance,  would  accept  of  any- 
thing that  might  bring  his  perfect  independence  into 
question.  He  died  when  I  was  absent  from  London  ; 
and  I  could  never  learn  the  circumstances  ;  for  he  had, 
I  believe,  no  relatives  ;  and  his  opulence,  during  the 
latter  years  of  his  life,  would  be  likely  to  throw  him 
into  the  hands  of  strangers.  His  books  are  filled  with 
extravagances  on  all  subjects  ;  and,  to  religious  people, 
they  are  especially  revolting,  by  the  uniform  spirit  of 
contempt  which  he  manifests  for  all  creeds  alike  — 
Christian,  Mahometan,  Buddhist,  Pagan.  In  fact,  he  was 
as  deliberate  and  resolute  an  Atheist  as  can  ever  have 
existed  :  but,  for  all  that,  and  although  wishing,  for  his 
own  sake,  that  he  had  been  a  more  religious  man,  or  at 
least  had  felt  a  greater  reverence  for  such  subjects,  and  a 
closer  sympathy  with  that  which,  for  so  vast  a  majority  of 
the  human  race,  must  ever  constitute  their  sole  consola- 
tion under  sorrow  and  calamity  ;  still  I  could  not  close 
my  eyes  to  the  many  evidences  which  his  writings  and 
his  conversation  afforded  of  a  true  grandeur  of  mind, 
and  of  a  calm  Spinosistic  state  of  contemplative  reverie. 
In  fact,  he  was  half  crazy.  But  his  mind,  like  a  shell 
taken  from  the  sea,  still  echoed  and  murmured  to  the 
multitudinous  sounds  and  forms  amongst  which  his 
former  years  had  been  passed.  The  many  nations 
amongst  whom  he  had  walked,  '  passing  like  night '  (as 
the  Ancient  Mariner  describes  himself)  '  from  land  to 
land,'  —  the  black  men,  and  the  white  men,  and  the 
'  dusk-faces  with  white  silken  turbands  wreathed,'  — 
were  present  for  ever,  and  haunted  his  inner  eye  with 
imagery  of  the  noblest  kind,  and  wdth  moving  pageant- 
ries, in  the  midst  of  silence  and  years  of  deafness.  He 
Was  himself  a  fine  specimen  of  the  animal  ^lan.  And, 
m  some  directions,  he  was  fine  also  intellectually.  Hii 


602 


LITERABY  KEMINISCENCES. 


books,  which  are  past  counting,  ought  to  be  searched,  and 
a  bead-roll  of  fine  thoughts,  or  eloquent  expressions  of 
old  ones,  separated  from  the  eccentric  speculations  with 
which  they  too  often  lie  interwoven.  These  books  con- 
tain, moreover,  some  very  wise  practical  suggestions, 
particularly  as  to  the  mode  of  warfare  adapted  to  the 
British  nation.  And  for  knowledge  of  national  character 
he  was  absolutely  unrivalled.  Some  time  or  other,  I  may 
myself  draw  up  a  memoir  of  his  life,  and  raise  a  tribute  to 
his  memory  by  a  series  of  extracts  such  as  I  have  sug- 
gested. 

Another  eminent  man  of  our  times,  whom  I  came  to 
know  in  my  later  visits  to  London,  was  the  Rev.  Edward 
Irving  ;  and,  in  some  respects,  he  is  naturally  recalled  by 
the  remembrance  of  Walking  Stewart ;  for,  like  him,  he 
had  a  fervid  nature,  a  most  energetic  will,  and  aspirations 
after  something  greater  than  he  could  find  in  life.  Like 
him,  also,  he  owed  not  very  much  to  education  or  study. 
Mr.  Irving,  unfortunately  for  his  own  reputation,  sinned  so 
enormously  against  prudence,  and  indeed  against  all 
sanity  of  mind  during  the  latter  part  of  his  career  —  his 
writings  and  his  actions  were  so  equally  indicative  of  an 
unsettled  intellect  —  that,  with  most  people,  this  sad 
revolution  in  his  nature  has  availed  to  extinguish  the 
recollection  of  that  unequalled  splendor  of  appearance 
with  which  he  convulsed  all  London  at  his  first  debut. 
He  was,  unquestionably,  by  many,  many  degrees,  the 
greatest  orator  of  our  times.  Of  him,  indeed,  more  than 
of  any  man  whom  I  have  seen  throughout  my  whole 
experience,  it  might  be  said,  with  truth  and  with  emphasis, 
that  he  was  a  Boanerges,  a.  son  of  thunder  ;  and,  in  a 
*;ense,  even  awful  and  unhappy  for  himself,  it  might  be 
affirmed  that  he  had  a  demon  within  himself.  Doubf 
there  can  now  be  none  that  he  was  insane,  or  partially  so, 


EDWARD  IRVINO. 


603 


from  the  very  first.  Not  many  weeks  after  his  first  burst 
upon  the  metropolis,  I  had  the  pleasure  of  meeting  him  at 
ft  dinner  party.  He  was  in  exuberant  spirits  ;  and  he 
Btrod3  about  the  drawing-room,  before  dinner,  with  the 
air  of  one  who  looked  upon  himself  as  clothed  with  the 
functions  of  Jonah  sent  to  Nineveh,  or  of  Paul  upon  a 
celestial  mission  to  the  Gentiles.  He  talked  a  good  deal 
of  phrenolog) ,  and  in  the  tone  of  one  who  had  entirely 
adopted  its  great  leading  doctrines.  My  head,  with  a  very 
Blight  apology  for  doing  so,  he  examined  :  his  report, 
being  somewhat  flattering,  I  shall  not  repeat,  further  than 
that  '  conscientiousness  '  was  found  in  great  strength,  and 
'  veneration,'  which  were  the  chief  moral  indications  that 
he  detected.  We  walked  homewards  together ;  and,  as  it 
happened  that  our  roads  coincided  for  three  miles  or  more, 
we  had  a  good  deal  of  conversation.  In  one  thing  he 
thoroughly  agreed  with  me,  viz.  in  disliking  common 
literary  society,  by  comparison  with  that  of  people  less 
pretending,  left  more  to  the  impulses  of  their  natural 
unchecked  feelings,  and  entertaining  opinions  less  mod- 
elled upon  w^hat  they  read.  One  ebullition  of  his  own 
native  disposition  was,  however,  not  very  amiable.  'Near 
Charing  Cross,  a  poor  houseless  female  vagrant  came  up 
to  us  and  asked  charity.  Now,  it  was  in  no  respect  sur- 
prising to  me,  that  Mr.  Irving  should  refuse  to  give  her 
anything,  knowing  that  so  many  excellent  people  system- 
atically set  their  faces  against  street  alms  ;  and  a  man, 
^he  most  kind-hearted  in  the  world,  whose  resources  are 
limited,  may  very  reasonably  prefer  throwing  whatever 
he  has  at  his  disposal  into  the  channels  of  well  organized 
charitable  institutions.  Not,  therefore,  the  refusal,  but 
the  manner  of  the  refusal,  it  was  which  surprised  me. 
Mr.  Irving  shook  off  the  poor  shivering  suppliant,  whose 
manner  was  timid  and  dejected,  with  a  roughness  that 


504 


LITEEAEY  BEMINISCENCES. 


would  have  better  become  a  parish  beadle  towards  a  stoul 
masterful  beggar,  counterfeiting  the  popular  character  of 
a  shipwrecked  mariner.  Yet  I  am  far  from  thinking,  or 
wishing  to  insinuate,  that  Edward  Irving  was  deficient  in 
benignity.  It  was  the  overmastering  demoniac  fervor  of 
his  nature,  the  constitutional  riot  in  his  blood,  more  than 
any  harshness  of  disposition,  which  prompted  his  fierce 
refusal. 

It  is  remarkable,  and  I  mention  it  as  no  proof  of  any 
sagacity  of  myself,  but,  on  the  contrary,  as  a  proof  of 
broad  and  palpable  indications,  open  and  legible  to  him 
who  ran,  that  from  what  I  saw  of  Mr.  Edward  Irving,  at 
this  first  interview,  I  drew  an  augury,  and  immediately 
expressed  it  to  more  than  one  friend ;  that  he  was  destined 
to  a  melancholy  close  of  his  career,  in  lunacy.  I  drew 
my  judgment  from  the  expression  and  the  peculiar  rest- 
lessness of  his  eye,  combined  with  the  untamable  fervor 
of  his  manner,  and  his  evident  craving  after  intense  states 
of  excitement.  I  believe  that  public  applause,  or  at  least 
public  sympathy  with  his  own  agitated  condition  of  feel- 
ing, and  public  attention,  at  any  rate  to  himself,  as  a  great 
moral  power  thundering  and  lightening  through  the  upper 
regions  of  the  London  atmosphere,  really  became  indis- 
pensable to  his  comfort.  The  effect  of  his  eloquence,  great 
as  that  certainly  was,  had  been  considerably  exaggerated 
to  the  general  estimate,  by  the  obstacles  opposed  to  the 
popular  curiosity,  in  the  mere  necessities  of  the  narrow 
chapel  within  which  he  preached.  Stories  of  carriage 
panels  beaten  in,  chapel  windows  beaten  out,  as  en- 
trances for  ladies  of  rank  and  distinguished  senators  — 
euch  stories  to  awaken  the  public  interest,  and  then  (as 
consequences  of  that  interest,  which  re-acted  to  sustain  and 
widen  it)  stories  of  royal  princesses,  lord  chancellors,  and 
oxime  ministers,  going,  in  spite  of  all  difficulties,  to  heai 


EDWAUD  IRVING. 


605 


whe  new  apostle  of  the  North  —  these  things  procured  for 
Mr.  Irving,  during  the  early  novitiate  of  his  London 
career,  if  not  great  audiences,  (which,  numerically  speak- 
ing, his  chapel  would  not  have  admitted,)  yet  so  memor- 
able a  conflict  of  competition  for  the  small  space  available 
to  those  who  had  no  private  right  of  admission,  that 
inevitably  the  result  was  misunderstood,  or,  at  least, 
misappreciated  by  the  public.  The  smaller  was  the 
disposable  accommodation,  so  much  the  hotter  was  the 
contest :  and  thus  a  small  chapel,  and  a  small  congregation 
told  more  effectually  in  his  favor,  more  emphatically 
proclaimed  his  sudden  popularity,  than  the  largest  could 
have  done.  Meantime,  the  presbytery,  availing  them- 
selves of  the  sudden  enthusiasm  called  into  life  by  this 
splendid  meteor,  collected  large  subscriptions  for  a  new 
chapel.  This  being  built  upon  a  scale  proportioned  to 
the  money,  offered  ample  accommodation  to  the  public 
curiosity.  That  feeling  could  not  wholly  have  subsided  ; 
but  many,  like  Wilberforce,  had  found  themselves  suffi- 
ciently gratified  by  a  single  experience  of  Mr.  Irving' s 
powers  ;  others,  upon  principle,  were  unwilling  to  leave 
their  old  pastors  —  not  to  mention  that,  for  the  majority, 
this  would  have  involved  a  secession  from  the  particular 
creed  to  which  they  adhered  ;  and,  when  deductions  were 
made  from  Mr.  Irving' s  audiences,  upon  these  and  other 
accounts,  those  who  still  went  as  extra  auditors  were  no 
^onger  numerous  enough,  now  that  they  were  diffused 
hrough  a  large  chapel,  to  create  the  former  tumultuous 
contests  for  admission. 

The  enthusiasm  of  the  public  had  now  subsided  and 
settled  into  a  condition  more  uniform,  and  no  longer 
capable  of  holding  up  a  mirror  which  reflected  Mr. 
Irving' s  own  intense  state  of  exaltation.  It  was  the  state 
of  collapse  whict   succeeded  in  his  mind,  the  want  of 


606 


LITERAKY  BEMINISCENCliS. 


correspondence  which  be  found  between  tbe  public  zeal 
to  be  taught  or  moved,  and  his  own  to  teach  or  move :  this 
it  was,  I  can  hardly  doubt,  which  drove  him  into  those 
crazy  speculations  which  eventually  cost  him  the  general 
respect,  and  led  to  an  open  breach  between  himself  and 
the  trustees  for  the  management  of  the  property  embarked 
upon  the  chapel.  Unable  to  win  the  popular  astonish- 
m.ent  by  the  legitimate  display  of  his  extraordinary  powers, 
he  attempted  to  secure  the  same  end  by  extravagance. 
The  whole  extent  of  this  extravagance,  it  is  true,  he  did 
not  perceive ;  for  his  mind  was  unhinged.  But  still  the 
insanity,  which  had  preyed  upon  him  from  the  very  first, 
lay  more  in  his  moral  nature,  and  in  a  disease  of  his  will, 
than  in  the  functions  of  his  intellect.  Disappointment, 
vexation  of  heart,  wounded  pride,  and  latterly,  perhaps, 
some  tinge  of  remorse  for  the  abuse  which  he  had  made 
of  his  magnificent  endowments,  all  combined,  with  the 
constitutional  fever  in  his  blood,  to  sap  his  health  and 
spirits.  That  he  was  very  unhappy,  latterly,  I  have  no 
doubt ;  nor  was  I,  for  my  part,  ever  called  upon  to  feel  so 
powerfully  the  conviction  that  here  was  a  ruined  man  of 
genius,  and  a  power  in  the  first  rank  of  great  moral 
agencies,  an  orator  the  most  Demosthenic  of  our  age, 
descending  rapidly  to  night  and  utter  extinction,  as  during 
ihe  whole  latter  years  of  Edward  Irving' s  troubled  ex- 
istence. I  am  not  singular  in  my  estimate  of  him  as  an 
orator  :  —  Mr.  Canning,  a  most  accomplished  orator  him- 
self, and,  as  a  great  artist^  the  first  orator  of  our  times, 
but  perhaps,  for  that  very  reason,  less  likely  to  do  full 
iustice  in  a  case  of  power  that  was  altogether  natural,  and 
no  way  indebted  to  art,  even  he  (when  visiting  Mr.  Bolton 
of  Storrs,  on  Windermere)  said  something  very  nearly  ap- 
proaching to  what  I  have  here  said.  I  did  not  hear  i* 
tiyself ;  but  I  afterwards  heard  it  from  many  who  did 


WILLIAM  WORDSWORTH. 


607 


He  was  tbe  only  man  of  our  times  who  realized  one's  idea 
of  Paul  preaching  at  Athens,  or  defending  himself  before 
King  Agrippa.  Terrific  meteor !  unhappy  son  of  fervid 
genius,  which  mastered  thyself  even  more  than  the  rapt 
audiences  which  at  one  time  hung  upon  thy  lips  !  were 
the  cup  of  life  once  again  presented  to  thy  lips,  wouldst 
thou  drink  again;  or  would  thou  not  rather  turn  away 
from  it  with  shuddering  abomination  ?  Sleep,  Boanerges  ! 
and  let  the  memory  of  man  settle  only  upon  thy  colossal 
powers,  without  a  thought  of  those  intellectual  aberrations 
which  were  more  powerful  for  thy  own  ruin  than  for  the 
misleading  of  others ! 

London,  however,  great  as  were  its  attractions,  did  but 
rarely  draw  me  away  from  Westmoreland.  There  I 
found  more  and  more  a  shelter  and  an  anchor  for  my  own 
wishes.  Originally,  as  I  have  mentioned,  the  moti\e 
which  drew  me  to  this  county,  in  combination  with  its 
own  exceeding  beauty,  had  been  the  society  of  Words- 
worth. But  in  this  I  committed  a  great  oversight.  Men 
of  extraordinary  genius  and  force  of  mind  are  far  better 
as  objects  for  distant  admiration  than  as  daily  companions  ; 
—  not  that  I  would  insinuate  anything  to  the  disadvantage 
of  Mr.  Wordsworth.  What  I  have  to  say  in  the  way  of 
^omplaint,  shall  be  said  openly  and  frankly ;  this  is  but 
fair ;  for  insinuations  or  covert  accusations  always  leave 
room  for  misconstruction  and  for  large  exaggeration. 
Mr.  Wordsworth  is  not  only  a  man  of  principle  and 
integrity,  according  to  the  severest  standard  of  such  a. 
character,  but  he  is  even  a  man,  in  many  respects,  of 
amiable  manners.  Still  there  are  traits  of  character 
^bout  him,  and  modes  of  expressing  them  in  his  manners, 
which  make  a  familiar  or  neighborly  intercourse  with  him 
^nful  and  mortifying.    Pride,  in  its  most  exalted  form, 


608 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


he  was  entitled  to  feel ;  but  something  there  was,  in  tha 
occasional  expression  of  this  pride,  which  was  difficult  to 
bear.  Upon  ground  where  he  was  really  strong,  Words- 
worth was  not  arrogant.  In  a  question  of  criticism,  he 
was  open  to  any  man's  suggestions.  But  there  were 
fields  ol  thought  or  of  observation  which  he  seemed  to 
think  locked  up  and  sacred  to  himself;  and  any  alien 
entrance  upon  those  fields  he  treated  almost  as  intrusions 
and  usurpations.  One  of  these,  and  which  naturally 
occurred  the  most  frequently,  was  the  whole  theory  of 
picturesque  beauty,  as  presented  to  our  notice  at  every 
minute  by  the  bold  mountainous  scenery  amongst  which 
we  lived,  and  as  it  happened  to  be  modified  by  the  sea- 
sons of  the  year,  by  the  time  of  day,  or  by  the  accidents 
of  light  and  shade.  Now  Wordsworth  and  his  sister  really 
had,  as  I  have  before  acknowledged,  a  peculiar  depth  of 
organic  sensibility  to  the  effects  of  form  and  color  ;  and  to 
them  I  was  willing  to  concede  a  vote,  such  as  in  ancient 
Rome  was  called  '  a  prerogative  vote,'  upon  such  ques- 
tions. But,  not  content  with  this,  Wordsworth  virtually 
claimed  the  same  precedency  for  all  who  were  connected 
with  himself,  though  merely  by  affinity,  and  therefore 
standing  under  no  colorable  presumption  (as  blood  re- 
lations might  have  done)  of  inheriting  the  same  constitu- 
tional gifts  of  organization.  To  everybody,  standing  out 
of  this  sacred  and  privileged  pale,  Wordsworth  behaved 
'vith  absolute  insult  in  cases  of  this  nature ;  he  did  not 
even  appear  to  listen  ;  but,  as  if  what  they  said  on  such  a 
theme  must  be  childish  prattle,  turned  away  with  an  air  of 
perfect  indifference  ;  began  talking,  perhaps,  with  another 
oerson  on  another  subject ;  or,  at  all  events,  never  noticed 
what  we  said,  by  an  apology  for  an  answer.  I,  very  early 
in  our  connection,  having  observed  this  inhuman  arro- 
gance, took  care  never  afterwards  to  lay  myself  under 


WILLIAM  WOKDSWORTH. 


609 


the  possibility  of  such  an  insult.  Systematically  I  avoided 
saying  anything,  however  sud-lenly  tempted  into  any  ex- 
pression of  my  feelings,  upon  the  natural  appearances, 
whether  in  the  sky  or  on  the  earth.  Thus  1  evaded  one 
cause  of  quarrel ;  and  so  far  Wordsworth  was  not  aware 
of  the  irritation  and  disgust  which  he  had  founded  in  the 
minds  of  his  friends.  But  there  were  other  manifestations 
of  the  same  ungenial  and  exclusive  pride,  even  still  more 
offensive  and  of  wider  application. 

With  other  men,  upon  finding  of  thinking  one's  self  ill- 
used,  all  one  had  to  do  was  to  make  an  explanation  ;  and, 
with  any  reasonable  grounds  of  complaint,  or  any  reason- 
able temper  to  manage,  one  was  tolerably  sure  of  redress. 
Not  so  with  Wordsworth ;  ho  had  learned  from  Mrs. 
C  a  vulgar  phrase  for  all  attempts  at  reciprocal  ex- 
planations —  he  called  them  contemptuously  'fending  and 
proving,''  And  you  might  lay  your  account  with  being 
met  in  limine,  and  further  progress  barred,  by  a  declara- 
tion to  this  effect  — '  Mr.  X  Y  Z,  I  will  have  nothing  to  da 
with  fending  and  proving.'  This  amounted,  in  other 
words,  to  saying,  that  he  conceived  himself  to  be  liberated 
from  those  obligations  of  justice  and  courtesy  by  which 
other  men  are  bound.  Now,  I  knew  myself  well  enough 
to  be  assured  that,  under  such  treatment,  I  should  feel  too 
much  indignation  and  disgust  to  persevere  in  courting  the 
acquaintance  of  a  man  who  thus  avowed  his  contempt  for 
the  laws  of  equal  dealing.  Redress  I  knew  that  I  should 
never  get ;  and,  accordingly,  I  reasoned  thus  :  —  '  I  have 
been  ill-used  to  a  certain  extent ;  but  do  I  think  that  a 
sufficient  reason  for  giving  up  all  my  intimacy  with  a  man 
like  Wordsworth  ?  If  I  do  not,  let  me  make  no  com- 
plaint ;  for,  inevitably,  if  I  do  make  complaint,  that  will  be 
Ihe  result.  For,  though  I  am  able  to  bear  the  particular 
wrong  I  now  complain  of,  yet  I  feel  that  even  from  Words- 
39 


^tO  LITEKARY  REMINISCENCES 

I  could  not  tolerate  an  open  and  contemptuous 
refusal  of  justice.  The  result,  then,  if  I  pursue  this 
matter,  will  be  to  rob  me  of  Wordsworth's  acquaintance. 
Reparation,  already  necessary  to  my  feelings,  will  then 
become  necessary  to  my  honor :  I  shall  fail  to  obtain  it ; 
and  then  it  will  become  my  duty  to  renounce  his  acquaint- 
ance.   I  will,  therefore,  rest  contentedly  where  I  am.' 

What  then  were  the  cases  of  injustice  which  I  had  to 
complain  of?  Such  they  were  as  between  two  men  could 
hardly  have  arisen ;  but  wherever  there  are  women  — 
unless  the  terms  on  which  the  parties  stand  are  most  free 
and  familiar,  so  that  fast  as  clouds  arise  of  misunderstand- 
ing, explanations  may  have  full  leave  to  move  concur- 
rently, and  nothing  be  left  for  either  side  to  muse  upon  as 
wrong,  or  meditated  insult  —  I  hold  it  next  to  impossible 
that  occasions  should  not  arise  in  which  both  parties  will 
suspect  some  undervaluing,  or  some  failure  in  kindness  or 
respect.  I,  to  give  one  example,  had,  for  the  controller  of 
my  domestic  manege,  a  foolish,  selfish,  and  ignorant  old 
maid.  Naturally,  she  ought  to  have  been  no  enemy  to  the 
Wordsworths,  for  she  had  once  lived  as  a  servant  with 
them  ;  and,  for  my  service,  she  had  been  engaged,  at  high 
wages,  by  Miss  Wordsworth  herself.  These  motives  to  a 
special  regard  for  the  W.'s,  were  not  weighty  enough  to 
overrule  her  selfishness.  Having  unlimited  power  in  all 
which  regarded  the  pecuniary  arrangements  of  my  house, 
she  became  a  person  of  some  consideration  and  some 
power  amongst  her  little  sphere.  In  my  absence,  she  took 
upon  herself  the  absolute  command  of  everything  ;  and  I 
could  easily  perceive,  by  different  anecdotes  which  reached 
me,  that  she  was  jealous  of  any  abridgment  to  her  own 
supreme  discretion,  such  as  might  naturally  arise  through 
any  exercise  of  those  friendly  rights,  claim.>d  in  my  ab- 
lience,  by  those  friends  who  conceived  themselves  to  hava 


"WILLIAM  WORDSWORTH. 


611 


the  freedom  of  my  house,  and  the  right  to  use  its  accom* 
tnodations  in  any  honorable  way  prompted  by  their  own 
convenience.  To  my  selfish  housekeeper  this  was  a  dan* 
gerous  privilege ;  for,  if  it  had  brought  no  other  evil  with 
it,  inevitably  it  would  sometimes  lay  a  restraint  upon  her 
gadding  propensity,  and  detain  her  at  home  during 
months  when  otherwise  my  great  distance  gave  her  the 
amplest  privilege  of  absence.  In  shaping  remedies  for  this 
evil,  which,  from  natural  cowardice,  she  found  it  difficult 
to  oppose  in  her  own  person,  she  had  a  ready  resource  in 
charging  upon  myself  the  measures  which  she  found  con- 
venient. '  Master  [which  was  her  technical  designation 
for  myself]  thinks  thus,'  or  '  Master  left  such  and  such 
directions.'  These  were  obvious  fictions,  for  a  woman 
so  selfish  and  mean.  Any  real  friend  of  mine  ought  to 
have  read,  in  the  very  situation  which  this  woman  held  — 
in  her  obvious  interest,  connected  with  her  temper  —  a 
sufficient  commentary  upon  the  real  state  of  things.  A 
man  more  careless  than  myself  of  the  petty  interests  con- 
cerned in  such  a  case  could  not  exist.  And  it  may  be 
supposed  with  what  disgust  and  what  reasonable  indigna- 
tion I  heard  of  opinions  uttered  upon  my  character  by 
those  who  called  themselves  my  friends ;  opinions  shaped 
to  meet,  not  any  conduct  which  I  had  ever  held,  or  which 
it  could  be  pretended  that  I  had  countenanced,  but  to  meet 
the  false  imputations  of  an  interested  woman,  who  was 
by  those  imputations  doing  to  me  a  far  deeper  injury  than 
to  those  whom  she  merely  shut  out  from  a  momentary 
accommodation. 

But  why  not,  upon  discovering  such  forgeries  and  mis- 
••epresentations,  openly  and  loudly  denounce  them  for  what 
Vhey  were  ?  I  answer,  that  when  a  man  is  too  injuriously 
wounded  by  the  words  of  his  soi-disant  friends,  oftentimes 
a  strong  movement  of  pride  makes  it  painful  for  him  to 


612 


LITEBARY  "REMINISCEXCES. 


degrade  himself  by  explanations  or  justifications.  Besides 
that,  when  once  a  false  idea  has  prepossessed  the  minds  o( 
your  friends,  justification  oftentimes  becomes  impossible. 
My  servant,  in  such  a  case,  would  have  worn  the  air  oi 
one  who  had  offended  me,  not  by  a  base  falsehood,  but  by 
an  imprudence  in  betraying  too  much  of  the  truth ;  and, 
doubtless,  when  my  back  was  turned,  she  would  insinuate 
that  her  own  interest  had  obliged  her  to  put  up  with  my 
disavowal  of  what  she  had  done ;  but  that,  in  literal  truth, 
she  had  even  fallen  short  of  my  directions.  Others,  again, 
would  think  that,  though  no  specific  directions  might  have 
been  given  to  her,  possibly  she  had  collected  my  sincere 
wishes  from  words  of  complaint  dropped  casually  upon 
former  occasions.  Thus,  in  short,  partly  I  disdained, 
partly  I  found  it  impossible,  to  exonerate  myself  from 
those  most  false  imputations  ;  and  I  sate  down  half-con- 
tentedly  under  accusations  which,  in  every  solemnity  of 
truth,  applied  less  justly  to  myself  than  to  any  one  person 
I  knew  amongst  the  whole  circle  of  my  acquaintance. 
The  result  was,  that  evjer  after  I  hated  the  name  of  the 
woman  at  whose  hands  I  had  sustained  this  wrong,  so  far 
as  such  a  woman  could  be  thought  worthy  of  hatred ;  and 
that  I  began  to  despise  a  little  some  of  those  who  had  been 
silly  and  undiscerning  enough  to  accredit  such  representa- 
tions ;  and  one  of  them  especially,  who,  though  liberally 
endowed  with  sunshiny  temper  and  sweetness  of  disposi- 
tion, was  perhaps  a  person  weak,  intellectually,  beyond 
the  ordinary  standards  of  female  weakness. 

Hence  began  the  waning  of  my  friendship  with  the 
Words  worths.  But,  in  reality,  never  after  the  first  year  or 
BO  from  my  first  introduction,  had  I  felt  much  possibility 
of  drawing  the  bonds  of  friendship  tight  with  a  man  of 
Wordsworth's  nature.  He  seemed  to  me  too  much  like 
his  own  Pedlar  in  the  '  Excursion ; '  a  man  so  diff'used 


WILLIAM  WOBDSWOBTH. 


amongst  innumerable  objects  of  equal  attraction,  that  he 
had  no  cells  left  in  his  heart  for  strong  individual  attach- 
ments. I  was  UL  \  singular  in  this  feeling.  Professor  Wil- 
son had  become  estranged  from  him :  Coleridge,  one  of 
his  earliest  fri3nds,  had  become  estranged :  no  one  person 
could  be  deemed  fervently  his  friend.  And,  with  respect 
to  Coleridge,  he  certainly  had  strong  reasons  to  be  es- 
tranged ;  and  equally  certain  it  is  that  he  held  a  profound 
sense  of  those  reasons  for  some  years.  He  told  me  him- 
self, and  this  was  his  peculiar  inference  from  the  case,  and 
what  he  made  its  moral,  that  married  people  rarely  retain 
much  capacity  of  friendship.  Their  thoughts,  and  cares, 
and  anxieties,  are  all  so  much  engrossed  by  those  who 
naturally  and  rightly  sit  nearest  to  their  hearts,  that  other 
friends,  chosen,  perhaps,  originally  for  intellectual  quali- 
ties chiefly,  and  seen  only  at  casual  intervals,  must,  by 
mere  human  necessity,  come  to  droop  and  fade  in  their 
remembrance.  I  see  no  absolute  necessity  for  this ;  nor 
have  I  felt  it  since  my  own  experience  of  the  situatior 
supposed  by  Coleridge  has  enabled  me  to  judge.  But,  at 
all  events,  poor  Coleridge  had  found  it  true  in  his  own 
case.  The  rupture  between  him  and  Wordsworth,  which 
rather  healed  itself  by  lapse  of  time  and  the  burning  dim 
of  fierce  recollections,  than  by  any  formal  reconciliation 
or  pardon  exchanged  between  the  parties,  arose  thus  :  — 
An  old  acquaintance  of  Coleridge's  happening  to  visit  the 
Lakes,  proposed  to  carry  Coleridge  with  him  to  London  on 
his  return.  This  gentleman's  wife,  a  lady  of  some  dis- 
tinction as  to  person  and  intellectual  accomplishments,  had 
an  equal  pleasure  in  Coleridge's  society.  They  had  a 
place  disposable  in  their  travelling  carriage;  and  thus  all 
things  tallied  towaras  the  general  purpose.  Meantime, 
Wordsworth,  irritated  with  what  he  viewed  as  excessive 
vanity  in  this  gentleman,  (for  his  plan  of  taking  Coleridge 


614 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


to  London  and  making  him  an  inmate  in  his  house,  had 
originated  in  a  higher  purpose  of  weaning  Coleridge  from 
opium,)  ridiculed  the  whole  scheme  pointedly,  as  a  vision- 
ary and  Quixotic  enterprise,  such  as  no  man  of  worldly 
experience  could  ever  seriously  countenance.  The  dis- 
pute —  for  it  took  that  shape  —  tempted  or  drove  Words- 
worth into  supporting  his  own  views  of  Coleridge's  abso- 
lute incorrigibility,  by  all  the  anecdotes  he  could  gather 
together  illustrative  of  the  utter  and  irredeemable  slavery 
which  had  mastered  the  poor  opium-martyr's  will.  And, 
most  assuredly,  he  drew  such  a  picture  of  Coleridge,  and 
of  his  sensual  effeminacy,  as  ought  not  to  have  proceeded 
from  the  hands  of  a  friend.  Notwithstanding  all  this,  the 
purpose  held  amongst  the  three  contracting  parties :  they 
went  southwards  ;  and,  for  a  time,  the  plan  was  still  farther 
realized,  of  making  Coleridge,  not  merely  a  travelling 
companion,  but  also  an  inmate  of  their  house.  This  plan, 
however,  fell  through,  in  consequence  of  incompatible 
habits.  And,  in  the  feud  which  followed,  this  gentleman 
and  his  wife  upbraided  Coleridge  with  the  opinions  held  of 
him  by  his  own  oldest  and  most  valued  friend,  William 
Wordsworth ;  and,  perhaps  as  much  to  defend  themselves 
as  to  annoy  Coleridge,  they  repeated  many  of  the  argu- 
ments used  by  Wordsworth,  and  of  the  anecdotes  by 
which  he  supported  them  ;  anecdotes  which,  unfortunately, 
vouched  for  their  own  authenticity,  and  were  self-attested, 
since  none  but  Wordsworth  could  have  known  them. 

I  have  mentioned  the  kind  of  wrongs  which  first  caused 
my  personal  feelings  to  grow  colder  towards  tbe  Words- 
worths  ;  and  there  were,  afterwards,  others  added  ;o  these, 
of  a  nature  still  more  irritating,  because  they  related  to 
more  delicate  topics.  And,  again  and  again,  I  was  pro- 
voked to  wonder  that  persons,  of  whom  some  commanded 
respect  and  attention  simply  as  the  near  connections  of  % 


WILLIAM  W0IID3W0IITH. 


615 


great  man,  should  so  far  forget  the  tenure  m  which  theii 
influeflice  rested,  as  to  arrogate  a  tone  of  authority  upon 
their  own  merits.    Meantime,  however  much  my  personal 
feelings  had  altered  gradually  towards  Wordsworth  ;  and 
more,  I  think,  in  connection  with  his  pride  than  through 
any  or  all  other  causes  acting  jointly,  (insomuch  that  I 
used  to  say.  Never  describe  Wordsworth  as  equal  in  pride 
to  Lucifer  ;  no,  but  if  you  have  occasion  to  write  a  life  of 
Lucifer,  set  down  that,  by  possibility,  in  respect  to  pride, 
he  might  be  some  type  of  Wordsworth ;)  still,  I  say,  my 
intellectual  homage  to  Wordsworth  had  not  been  shaken. 
Even  this,  however,  in  a  course  of  years,  had  gradually 
been  modified.    It  is  impossible  to  imagine  the  perplexity 
of  mind  which  possessed  me  when  I  heard  Wordsworth 
ridicule  many  books  which  I  had  been  accustomed  to 
admire  profoundly.    For  some  years,  so  equally  ineradi- 
cable was  either  influence  —  my  recollection,  on  the  one 
hand,  of  the  books  despised,  and  of  their  power  over  my 
feelings  ;  on  the  other,  my  blind  and  unquestioning  vene- 
ration for  Wordsworth  —  that  I  was  placed  in  a  strange 
sort  of  contradictory  life  ;  feeling  that  things  were  and 
were  not  at  the  same  instant ;  believing  and  not  believing 
in  the  same  breath.    And  not  until  I  had  read  much  in 
German  critics,  of  what  they  were  the  first  to  notice,  viz. 
the  accident  of  einseitigkeit,  or  one-sidedness,  as  a  pecu- 
liarity not  unfrequently  besetting  the  strongest  minds,  did  I 
slowly  come  to  the  discovery  that  Wordsworth,  beyond 
all  men,  perhaps,  that  have  ever  lived,  (and  very  likely  as 
one  condition  towards  the  possibility  of  his  own  exceeding 
originality,)  was  einseitig  in  extremity.    This  one-sided- 
ness shows  itself  most  conspicuously  in  his  dislikings  ;  but 
occasionally  even  in  his  likings.    Cotton,  for  instance, 
whom,  in  one  of  his  critical  disquisitions,  he  praises  so 
^•xtravagantly  for  his  fancy,  has  never  found  an  admirei 


616 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


except  in  himself.  And  this  mistake  to  be  made  in  a  field 
of  such  enormous  opulence  as  is  that  of  fancy  ! 

But,  omitting  many  flagrant  instances,  the  one  which 
most  appalled  myself  was  the  following  :  —  The  *  Canter- 
bury Tales '  of  the  Miss  liCes  are  sufficiently  well  known, 
but  not  sufficiently  appreciated  ;  and  one  reason  may  be, 
that  the  very  inferior  tales  of  Miss  Sophia  Lee  are  mingled 
with  those  of  Miss  Harriet.  Two  of  those  written  by 
Harriet,  viz.  The  Landlady's  Tale  and  The  German's^ 
are  absolutely  unrivalled  as  specimens  of  fine  narration. 
With  respect  to  the  latter,  it  is  well  known  that  Lord 
Byron  travestied  this  inimitable  tale  into  a  most  miserable 
drama  ;  interweaving  with  the  dialogue  of  his  piece  every 
word  in  the  original  conversations,  unaltered  nearly,  and 
assuredly  not  bettered.  And  the  very  act  of  borrowing  a 
plot  from  a  tale  in  which  so  very  much  depends  upon  the 
plot,  and  where  it  is  of  a  kind  that  will  not  bend  to  altera- 
tions, or  modifications  of  any  kind  ;  this  in  itself  bespoke 
a  poor  ambition,  and  the  servile  spirit  *  of  a  plagiarist. 
This  most  splendid  tale  I  put  into  the  hands  of  Words- 
worth ;  and  for  once,  having,  I  suppose,  nothing  else  to 
read,  he  condescended  to  run  through  it.  I  shall  not 
report  his  opinion,  which,  in  fact,  was  no  opinion  ;  for  the 
whole  colossal  exhibition  of  fiendish  grandeur  in  Conrad ; 
the  fine  delineation  of  mixed  power  and  weakness  in 
Siegendorf ;  and  the  exquisite  relief  given  to  the  whole 
by  the  truly  Shakspearian  portrait  of  feminine  innocence 
and  nobility  in  Josephine  ;  he  had  failed  so  much  as  to 
guess  at.  All  that  he  wondered  at  was  the  Machia- 
velian  insight  into  motives,  and  the  play  of  human  char- 

*  It  is  quite  unknown  to  the  world  that  Lord  Byron's  poem  of 
•  Lara  *  had  already  contained  a  gross  plagiarism  from  Miss  H.  Lee. 
the  whole  outline  of  the  story,  and  many  remarkable  phrases,  art 
lorrowed  from  The  German^s  Tale. 


WILLIAM  WORDSWORTH 


617 


itcter  ;  with  respect  to  whicli  he  said,  coldly  enough,  that 
t  left  an  uncomfortable  impression  of  a  woman  as  being 
too  clever.  Schiller's  '  Wallenstein,'  again,  was  equally 
unpleasing  to  him  and  unintelligible.  Most  people  have 
been  enraptured  with  the  beautiful  group  of  Max.  Piccolo- 
mini  and  the  Princess  Thekla ;  both  because  they  furnish 
a  sweet  relief  to  the  general  harsh  impression  from  so 
many  worldly-minded,  scheming,  treacherous,  malignant 
ruffians,  meeting  together,  in  one  camp,  as  friends,  or 
rivals,  or  betrayers  ;  and  also  on  their  own  separate  ac- 
count, even  apart  from  the  relation  which  they  bear  to 
the  whole  ;  for  both  are  noble,  both  innocent,  both  young, 
and  both  unfortunate  :  a  combination  of  advantages  tow- 
ards winning  our  pity  which  has  rarely  been  excelled. 
Yet  Wordsworth's  sole  remark  to  me,  upon  Wallenstein, 
was  this  ;  that  he  could  not  comprehend  Schiller's  mean- 
ing or  object  in  entailing  so  much  unhappiness  upon  these 
young  people  ;  a  remark  that,  to  me,  was  incomprehensi- 
ble ;  for  why,  then,  did  Shakspeare  make  Ophelia,  Desde- 
mona,  Cordelia,  unhappy  ?  Or  why,  to  put  the  question 
more  generally,  did  any  man  ever  write  a  tragedy  ? 

Perhaps,  to  the  public,  it  may  illustrate  Wordsworth's 
one-sidedness  more  strikingly,  if  I  should  mention  my 
firm  persuasion  that  he  has  never  read  one  page  of  Sir 
Walter  Scott's  novels.  Of  this  I  am  satisfied  ;  though  it 
is  true  that,  latterly,  feeling  more  indulgently  to  the  public 
favorites  as  the  public  has  come  to  appreciate  himself 
more  justly,  he  has  spoken  of  these  tales  in  a  tone  of 
assumed  enthusiasm.^  One  of  Mrs.  Radcliffe's  romances, 
viz.  '  The  Italian,'  he  had,  by  some  strange  accident, 
read ;  read,  out  only  to  laugh  at  it ;  whilst,  on  the  other 
hand,  the  novels  of  Smollett,  Fielding,  and  Le  Sage  — 


♦  *  Yarrow  Revisited.' 


618 


LITERAST  REMINISCENCES. 


BO  disgusting  by  their  moral  scenery  and  the  whole  state 
of  vicious  society  in  which  they  keep  the  reader  moving  : 
these,  and  merely  for  the  ability  of  the  execution,  he 
read  and  remembered  with  extreme  delight. 

Without  going  over  any  other  examples,  it  may  weL 
be  understood  that,  by  these  striking  instances  of  defecti^  e 
sympathy  in  Wordsworth  with  the  universal  feelings  ol 
his  age,  my  intellectual,  as  well  as  my  personal  regard 
for  him,  would  be  likely  to  suffer.  In  fact,  I  learned, 
gradually,  that  he  was  not  only  liable  to  human  error,  but 
that,  in  some  points,  and  those  of  large  extent,  he  was 
frailer  and  more  infirm  than  most  of  his  fellow-men.  I 
viewed  this  defect,  it  is  very  true,  as  being  the  condition 
and  the  price,  as  it  were,  or  ransom  of  his  own  extraor- 
dinary power  and  originality  ;  but  still  it  raised  a  curtain 
which  had  hitherto  sustained  my  idolatry.  I  viewed  him 
now  as  a  mixed  creature,  made  up  of  special  infirmity 
and  special  strength.  And,  finally,  I  now  viewed  him  as 
no  longer  capable  of  an  equal  friendship. 

With  this  revolution  in  my  feelings,  why  did  I  not  now 
leave  Westmoreland  ?  I  will  say  :  Other  attractions 
had  arisen  ;  different  in  kind  ;  equally  potent  in  degree. 
These  stepped  in  to  enchain  me,  precisely  as  my  previous 
chains  were  unlinking  themselves,  and  leaving  me  in 
freedom. 

In  these  sketches  (written  with  so  much  hurry  as,  in  no 
one  instance  that  I  remember,  to  have  allowed  me  time 
for  once  reading  over  a  single  paragraph  of  what  I  had 
written),  I  have  usually  thought  it  best,  in  the  few  cases 
where  I  had  afterwards  an  opportunity  of  correcting  the 
press  errors,  simply  to  restore  the  word  which  it  was 
probable  or  apparent  that  I  had  originally  written  ;  oi 
which,  at  least,  I  must  have  meant  to  write.  Changes 


WALKING  STEWART. 


^19 


more  extensive  than  this  it  could  not  be  advisable  to  make, 
in  a  case  where  I  had  no  opening  for  a  thorough  recast  of 
the  whole.  Even  in  those  instances  where  a  thought,  or 
an  expression,  or  a  statement  of  facts,  might  be  calculated 
to  do  me  some  little  injury,  unless  it  were  expanded,  or 
accompanied  with  an  explanation,  or  more  cautiously  re» 
Btricted,  I  thought  it  better  on  the  whole,  to  abide  the 
hazard  ;  placing  my  reliance  for  the  redress  of  any  harsh 
judgment  on  the  absolute  certainty,  that  each  successive 
'oionth  washes  out  of  the  public  mind  every  trace  of  what 
ixiay  have  occupied  it  in  any  previous  month.  But,  in  this 
sketch  of  Walking  Stewart,  there  is  something  which 
demands  a  more  instant  explanation  ;  for  it  happens  that, 
at  this  moment  of  revising  the  press  errors,  an  anecdote 
occurs  to  me,  which  illustrates  the  danger,  in  such  a  case, 
of  a  permanent  misconstruction.  Many  years  ago,  I  was 
spending  a  few  days  at  the  country-house  of  a  foreign 
merchant.  His  wife,  a  very  intelligent,  and  even  intel- 
lectual person,  came  to  me  one  morning  with  a  book  in 
her  hand,  of  which  several  leaves  had  been  torn  into  frag- 
ments. Her  features,  generally  placid  and  amiable,  wore 
an  expression  of  matronly  scorn.  She  blushed,  but  it  was 
more  with  indignation  than  with  feminine  shame,  as  she 
put  the  book  into  my  hands^  It  was  mine,  she  said,  my 
property ;  and  therefore  she  had  not  tossed  it  into  the  fire. 
One  of  her  infant  children  had  found  it,  and  had  dealt 
with  it  as  I  saw  :  *  and,  if  the  child  had  destroyed  the 
whole  of  it,  she  could  not  think  that  I  was  much  entitled 
to  complain.'  It  was  one  of  my  Peripatetic  friend's 
essays,  under  some  such  title  as  The  Apocalypse  of  Na- 
ture, or,  The  Revelation  of  Reason, 

Tliis  accident,  directing  my  eye  to  the  part  of  the  vol- 
ume which  had  been  injured,  reminded  me  of  a  fact  which 
otherwise  I  had  naturally  enough  forgotten,  viz.  that 


620 


LITERARY  BEMINISCENCES. 


Walking  Stewart  had  occasionally  touched  on  subjects 
quite  unfitted  for  a  public  treatment ;  or,  at  least,  as 
questions  for  philosophic  speculation,  calling  for  the  dis- 
guise of  a  learned  language.  I  made  my  peace  with  the 
lady  by  assuring  her,  first,  that  (this  particular  volume 
being  one  of  many  by  the  same  author)  I  had  not  been 
aware  of  the  gross  passages  which  appeared  to  disfigure 
it  near  the  end  ;  and,  secondly,  (which  part  of  my  apology 
it  is  that  I  now  direct  to  my  readers,)  that  my  personal 
knowledge  of  the  man  modified  to  my  mind  the  doctrines 
of  the  author.  Things  said  broadly  and  coarsely,  which 
could  not  but  shock  strangers,  to  my  interpretation,  were 
blunted  and  defeated  in  their  effect  by  the  private  knowl- 
edge I  had  of  the  writer's  ultimate  object,  and  of  the 
inartificial  mode  in  which  he  dealt  with  his  native  lan- 
guage. Language  was  too  complex  a  machine  for  his 
management.  He  had  never  been  an  accurate  scholar ; 
and  his  idiom  had  entangled  itself  with  the  many  exotic 
idioms  which  at  times  he  had  used  familiarly  for  years. 

Under  the  spirit  of  this  general  apology,  I  beg  to  shel- 
ter whatever  I  may  have  asserted  of  Mr.  Stewart  as  a 
philosophic  speculator.  He  was  a  man  religious  by  tem- 
perament and  the  tendency  of  all  his  feelings ;  yet  it  is 
true  that  his  mere  understanding,  yielding  itself  up  to 
speculations  which  he  could  not  manage,  has  prompted 
the  most  scornful  expressions  towards  all  doctrinal  reli- 
gions alike.  He  was  pure  and  temperate  in  his  habits  oi 
life  beyond  the  common  standard  of  men  ;  yet  his  page 
was  sometimes  stained  with  sentiments  too  gross  and 
animal.  Ignorant  of  philosophy  in  its  forms  and  termi- 
nology, he  was,  by  capacity  of  profound  reverie,  a  true 
^philosopher  —  in  the  sense  that  he  felt  his  way  to  truths 
greater  and  deeper  than  he  could  a^.ways  explain ;  and, 
finally,  though  his  books  are  filled  with  strong  (oftentimes 


WALKING  8TEWAKT. 


621 


harsh  truths,  he  was,  as  a  man,  the  most  comprehen- 
sively benign,  the  most  largely  in  sympathy  with  human 
nature,  of  any  whom  I  have  yet  known.  He  passed  his 
latter  years  in  utter  deafness  ;  [in  noticing  which,  let  me 
observe  that  the  image  of  the  shell  which  I  have  used, 
though  not  consciously,  at  the  moment  of  writing,  taken 
from  Wordsworth's  '  Excursion,'  or  from  Mr.  Savage 
Landor's  '  Gebir,'  must  have  been  derived  from  one  or 
other  of  those  poems  :]  he  was  deaf,  as  respected  any 
music  that  could  come  to  him  from  the  world  :  and  he  was 
also  dumb,  as  respected  anv  music  that  could  reach  the 
world  from  ram  :  so  profound  was  his  inability  to  explain 
himself,  except  at  times,  in  conversation.  Actually,  there- 
fore, he  wiix  be  lost  and  forgotten.  Potentially,  he  was  a 
great  man. 


622 


lillEEABY  B£MINISC£NC£8 


CHAPTER  XXII. 


TALFOURD.— THE  LONDON  MAGAZINE.  —  JUNIUS. — 
CLARE.  —  ALLiVN  CUNNINGHAM. 


Whilst  I  am  upon  the  ground  of  London,  that  'natic  n 
of  London,'  (as  I  have  elsewhere  called  it,)  which  I  havpi 
60  often  visited,  and  yet  for  periods  so  brief,  that  my  entire 
London  life,  if  transposed  from  its  dislocated  periods  into 
one  continuous  aggregate,  would  not  make  above  one  and 
a  half  year  in  the  whole  result,  it  may  be  as  well  to  notice 
some  other  circumotances,  partly  of  a  literary,  partly  of  a 
general  interest,  and  which  might  be  worthy  of  notice  in 
any  man's  life,  but  were  so  especially  in  the  life  of  one 
who  held  some  peculiar  principles  —  compromises,  in 
a  measure  between  the  extreme  principles  commonly 
avowed  —  which  I  shall  explain  in  connection  with  the 
occasion.  First,  then,  confining  myself  to  my  London 
literary  experience :  it  was  not,  certainly,  extensive,  nor 
was  I  in  spirits  or  in  circumstances  to  wish  it  such.  I 
lived  in  the  most  austere  retirement ;  and  the  few  persons 
whom  I  saw  occasionally,  or  whose  hospitalities  I  received, 
were  gens  de  plume,  and  professedly  of  my  own  order  as 
practising  literati,  but  of  the  highest  pretensions.  Lamb 
I  have  already  mentioned.  Sergeant  Talfourd  I  became 
acquainted  with  in  the  beautiful  hall  of  the  Middle 
Temple,  whence  after  dining  together  in  the  agreeable 
style  inherited  from  elder  days,  and  so  pleasantly  recalling 


TALFOUBD. 


623 


the  noble  refectories  of  Oxford  amidst  the  fervent  tumults 
of  London)  we  sometimes  adjourned  to  our  coffee  at  the 
chambers  of  the  future  author  of  Jow,  and  enjoyed  the 
luxury  of  conversation  with  the  elite  of  the  young 
Templars,  upon  the  most  stirring  themes  of  life  or 
literature.  Him,  indeed,  I  had  known  when  a  Temple 
student.  But,  in  1821,  when  I  went  up  to  London 
avowedly  for  the  purpose  of  exercising  my  pen,  as  the 
one  sole  source  then  open  to  me  for  extricating  myself 
from  a  special  embarrassment,  (failing  which  case  of  dire 
necessity,  I  believe  that  I  should  never  have  written  a  line 
for  the  press  ;)  Mr.  Talfourd  having  become  a  practising 
barrister,  I  felt  that  I  had  no  right  to  trespass  upon  his 
time,  without  some  stronger  warrant  than  any  I  could 
plead  in  my  own  person.  I  had,  therefore,  requested  a 
letter  of  introduction  to  him  from  Wordsworth.  That 
was  a  spell  which,  with  this  young  lawyer,  I  knew  to  be 
all-potent ;  and,  accordingly  I  now  received  from  him  a 
great  deal  of  kindness,  which  came  specially  commended 
to  a  man  in  dejected  spirits,  by  the  radiant  courtesy  and 
the  cheerfulness  of  his  manners  :  for,  of  all  the  men  whom 
I  have  known,  after  long  intercourse  with  the  business  of 
the  world,  the  Sergeant  is  the  one  who  most  preserves,  to 
all  outward  appearance,  the  freshness  and  integrity  of  his 
youthful  spirits. 

From  him,  also,  I  obtained  an  introduction  to  Messrs. 
Taylor  &  Hessey,  who  had  very  recently,  upon  the 
melancholy  death  of  Mr.  Scott,  in  consequence  of  his 
duel  with  Mr.  Christie,  purchased  The  London  Magazine^ 
and  were  themselves  joint  editors  of  that  journal.  The 
ierms  they  held  out  to  contributors  were  ultra-munificent 

more  sc,  than  had  yet  been  heard  of  in  any  quarter 
whatsoever  ;  and,  upon  that  understanding  —  seeing  that 
nooaey  was  just  then  of  ^,ecessity,  the  one  sole  object  to 


624 


LITEKAKY  BEMINISCENCES. 


which  1  looked  in  the  cultivation  of  literature  —  naturally 
enough  it  happened  that  to  them  I  offered  my  earliest 
paper,  viz.  *  The  Confessions  of  an  English  Opium  Eater.' 
Of  the  two  publishers,  who  w^ere  both  hospitable  and 
friendly  men,  with  cultivated  minds,  one,  viz.  Mr.  Taylor, 
was  himself  an  author,  and,  upon  one  subject,  a  most 
successful  one  He  had  written,  indeed,  at  that  time, 
and  since  then,  I  understand,  has  written  again  upon 
different  parts  of  political  economy.  But  to  all  who  are 
acquainted  with  the  great  reformation  of  this  science, 
effected  by  David  Ricardo,  it  will  appear  as  a  matter  of 
course,  upon  looking  into  Mr.  Taylor's  works,  that  he 
should  be  found  to  have  merely  trifled.  In  reality,  the 
stern  application  of  one  single  doctrine  —  that,  namely, 
which  expounds  the  laws  of  value  - —  would  be  sufficient, 
as  I  believe,  of  itself,  to  demonstrate  the  reputation  of  Mr, 
Taylor's,  as  of  so  many  other  erroneous  views,  in  this 
severe  but  much-bewildering  science.  In  Mr.  Taylor's 
case,  from  what  I  saw  of  his  opinions  in  1821,  I  have 
reason  to  think  that  Locke  had  been  the  chief  instrument 
in  leading  him  astray.  Mr.  Taylor  professed  himself  a 
religious  dissenter  ;  and,  in  all  the  political  bearings  of 
dissent,  he  travelled  so  far,  that  if,  in  any  one  instance,  he 
manifested  an  illiberal  spirit,  it  was  in  the  temper  which 
he  held  habitually  towards  the  Church  of  England.  Then 
first,  indeed,  it  was  —  and  amongst  the  company  which  I 
sometimes  saw  at  Mr.  Taylor's  —  that  I  became  aware  of 
the  deadly  hatred  —  savage,  determined  hatred,  made  up 
for  mischief —  which  governed  a  large  part  of  the  well- 
educated  dissenters  in  their  feelings  towards  the  Church  of 
England.  Being  myself,  not  by  birth  and  breeding  only, 
but  upon  the  deliberate  adoption  of  my  judgment,  an 
affectionate  son  of  that  church,  in  respect  to  her  doctrines^ 
her  rites,  her  discipline,  and  her  internal  government, 


THE  i:iONI>ON  MAGAZINE. 


625 


was  both  shocked  and  grieved  to  meet  with  what  seemed 
to  me  80  much  levity  of  rash  judgment  amongst  the 
thoughtful  and  well-principled  —  so  harsh  an  illiberality 
amongst  the  liberal,  so  little  consideration  amongst  the 
considerate.  One  thing  was  clear  to  me  ;  that,  in  general, 
this  angry  spirit  of  hostility  was  grounded  upon  a  false, 
because  a  superannuated,  set  of  facts.  Never,  in  any 
great  public  corporation,  had  there  been,  as  I  well  knew, 
so  large  a  reformation  as  in  the  Church  of  England,  during 
the  last  forty  year?.  The  collateral  Church  of  Methodists, 
hardly  a  Dissenting  Church,  raised  up  by  John  Wesley, 
had,  after  one  generation  or  so,  begun  to  react  upon  the 
Metropolitan  Church,  out  of  whose  bosom  it  had  been 
projected.  The  two  universities  of  England  had  con- 
stantly fed  from  within  this  growing  galvanism  applied 
from  without :  Mr.  Simeon,  Professor  Farish,  Dean  Milner, 
m  Cambridge  ;  Mr.  Faber,  the  little  society  of  Edmund 
Hall,  &c.,  in  Oxford  ;  Mr.  Wilberforce,  Mr.  Babington, 
Mr.  Thornton,  in  the  Senate ;  Mrs.  Hannah  More  in 
literature  ;  severally  offered  a  nucleus,  around  which,  I 
have  understood,  the  open  profession  of  a  deeper,  more 
fervid,  and  apostolical  spirit  in  religious  opinions  and 
religious  practices,  had  been  emboldened  to  gather  ;  and 
the  result  has  been  that,  whilst  the  English  Church,  from 
Queen  Anne's  day  to  the  French  Revolution,  was  at  the 
lowest  point  of  its  depression,  and  absolutely  cankered  to 
the  heart  by  the  spirit  of  worldliness,  that  same  church  in 
our  days,  when  standing  on  the  brink,  apparently,  of  great 
trials,  and  summoned  to  put  forth  peculiar  vigilance  of 
watch  and  ward,  if  not  even  to  face  great  and  trying 
storms,  has,  by  great  examples,  by  extensive  religious 
associations,  and  by  a  powerful  press,  concurring  with  the 
unusual  thoughtfulness  generated  by  the  French  Revo- 
lution and  the  vast  changes  in  its  train,  most  seasonably 
40 


626 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


Deen  biought  gradually  into  a  frame  and  composition 
which  all  who  have  looked  with  interest  upon  the  case, 
deem  much  nearei  than  at  any  other  stage  of  its  history 
to  the  condition  ol  a  primitive  and  truly  pastoral  church. 

With  these  views  I  was  as  much  astonished  as  I  was 
grieved  to  find  the  Established  Church  an  object,  at  this 
particular  crisis,  of  enmity  so  profound.  Thus,  however, 
it  was.  Mr.  Taylor,  I  apprehend,  shared  in  all  the 
dominant  feelings  of  the  dissenters,  such  as  I  heard  them 
frequently  expressed  in  his  society ;  and  naturally,  there- 
fore, he  entertained,  amongst  other  literary  opinions,  a 
peculiar  and  perhaps  blind  veneration  for  Locke.  Locke, 
in  fact,  is  made  an  idol  amongst  the  '  Rational '  Dis- 
senters :  those  whose  religion  begins  and  terminates  in  the 
understanding.  This  idolatry  is  paid  to  him  in  a  double 
character,  as  the  most  eminent  patron  of  religious  liberty, 
and  as  the  propounder  of  views  in  Christianity  pretty 
much  akin  to  their  own  want  of  depth  and  in  '  anti- 
mysticism,*  as  a  friend  might  call  it  ;  but,  speaking 
sincerely  in  hostility  to  all  that  is  unfathomable  by  the 
mere  discursive  understanding.  I  am  not  here  going  to 
entertain  so  large  a  theme  as  the  philosophy  of  Locke. 
In  another  place  I  shall,  perhaps,  astonish  the  reader  by 
one  or  two  of  the  yet  undetected  blunders  he  has  com- 
mitted in  his  philosophy.  But,  confining  myself  to  his 
political  economy,  I  may  take  occasion  to  notice  one  error, 
with  regard  to  that  part  of  his  pretensions,  which  has 
misled  many.  By  mere  accident,  Locke  was  right,  in  his 
dispute  with  Lowndes  of  the  Treasury,  upon  a  question 
which  arose  in  connection  with  the  great  recoinage  ol 
King  William's  days.  At  the  request  of  Lord  Somers, 
Locke  undertook  the  discussion  ;  and,  as  he  happened  tc 
be  right  in  opposition  to  a  man  whose  ofl^icial  duty  it  wa« 
to  have  understood  the  subject  thoroughly  upcn  which  h« 


THE  LOMDON  MAGAZINE. 


ipecnlated  so  wildly,  this  advantage,  settling,  in  his  case, 
upon  a  novice  matched  against  a  doctor,  procured  for 
Locke  an  enthusiasm  of  admiration  which  the  case  did 
not  really  warrant ;  and  it  was  afterwards  imagined,  hy 
those  who  looked  back  casually  into  Locke's  treatises,  that 
he  was  a  sound  economist.  But  the  fact  is,  political 
economy  had,  in  those  days,  no  sort  of  existence  :  no  one 
doctrine,  not  so  much  as  that  which  unfolds  the  benefits 
from  the  division  of  labor  was  then  known  :  the  notion, 
again,  that  a  nation  did  or  could  benefit  by  commerce, 
otherwise  than  by  the  accident  of  selling  more  than  she 
bought,  and,  as  a  consequence,  by  accumulating  the 
balance  in  the  form  of  the  precious  metals — this  notion 
was  inconceivable  to  the  human  understanding  at  the  era 
of  Locke  :  no  progress  had  been  made  in  dissipating  that 
delusion  ;  and  Locke  was  as  much  enslaved  by  it  as  any 
other  man.  Possibly  —  and  there  is  some  room  to  think 
it  —  he  was  a  little  in  advance  of  the  Ciceronian  idea, 
that  the  very  possibility  of  a  gain,  in  any  transaction  of 
sale  between  two  parties,  was  logically  conceivable  only 
upon  the  assumption  of  a  deception  on  one  side  :  that, 
unless  they  would  '  lie  pretty  considerably,'  nisi  admodum 
mentiantur,)  merchants  must  resign  all  hope  of  profit. 
The  grounds  of  value,  again,  were  as  little  known  to 
Locke  as  the  consequences  of  those  grounds ;  and,  in 
short,  he  had  not  made  one  step  ahead  of  his  age  in  any 
one  branch  of  political  economy.  But,  in  his  dispute 
with  Lowndes,  the  victory  was  gained,  not  over  scientific 
blunders  by  scientific  lights  ;  no,  but  over  mere  logical 
blunders,  the  very  grossest,  by  common  sense  the  most 
palpable.  It  was  no  victory  of  a  special  science,  but  one 
pf  general  logic.  There  were  no  positive  truths  elicited, 
but  simply  a  refutation,  scarcely  in  that  age  needed,  oi 
lome  self-contradictory  errors.    Lowndes  had  so  far  con- 


628 


LITEKARY  REMINISCENCES. 


fused  liimself  as  to  suppose  that  the  same  ounce  of  silver 
might,  at  the  same  time  and  place,  be  worth  more  or  lesa 
than  itself,  when  thrown  into  the  shape  of  coin.  The 
most  obvious  truths  Locke  himself  appears  to  have  over- 
looked, notwithstanding  the  English  silver  currency  at 
that  moment  illustratad  some  of  them.  Locke,  therefore, 
exposed  a  set  of  errors  which  could  not  have  arisen  in 
anything  short  of  Irish  confusion  of  ideas  ;  and  the  truths 
of  an  affirmative  order  belonging  to  the  subject,  which, 
even  under  the  feeble  light  of  those  times,  might  have 
been  detected,  escaped  him  altogether.  So  much  I  have 
thought  it  right  to  say  on  Mr.  Taylor's  Political  Economy, 
ind  the  sort  of  sanction  which  he  seeks  to  draw  from 
Locke,  who  has  led  many  others  astray,  by  the  authority 
of  his  name,  upon  a  subject  over  which  he  has  no  sort 
of  jurisdiction  ;  neither  did  that  age  furnish  any  one  who 
had. 

But  if  Mr.  Taylor  failed  (as,  honestly,  I  believe  he  did) 
m  this  field,  in  another  he  effected  a  discovery  so  brilliant, 
so  powerfully  sustained  by  evidences  overwhelming  and 
irresistible,  after  (be  it  remembered)  efforts  the  most 
elaborate  and  numerous  to  solve  the  problem,  that  he 
certainly  deserves  a  high  place,  and  perhaps  next  to 
Bentley,  in  this  species  of  exploratory  literature.  With 
little  or  no  original  hints  to  direct  him  in  his  path,  he 
undertook  the  great  literary  enigma  of  Junius  —  Who  and 
what  was  he  ?  —  and  brought  that  question  to  a  decision 
that  never  can  be  unsettled  or  disturbed  by  any  person 
except  one  who  is  unacquainted  with  the  arguments.  I 
have  understood,  but  perhaps  not  upon  sufficient  authority, 
that  the  notice  of  this  work  in  The  Edinburgh  Review 
was  drawn  up  by  Lord  Brougham.  If  so,  I  must  confess 
my  surprise  :  there  is  not  much  of  a  lawyer's  accuracy  in 
thn  abstract  of  the  evidence,  nor  is  the  result  stated  with 


JUNIUS. 


62^1 


ihe  boldness  which  tlie  premises  warrant.  Chief  Justice 
Dallas,  of  the  Common  Pleas,  was  wont  to  say  that  a  man 
arraigned  as  Junius  upon  the  evidence  here  accumulated 
against  Sir  Philip  Francis,  must  have  been  convicted  in 
any  court  of  Europe.  But  I  would  go  much  farther  :  I 
would  say  that  there  are  single  proofs,  which  (taken 
separately  and  apart  from  all  the  rest)  are  sufficient  to 
sustain  the  whole  onus  of  the  charge.  I  would  also  argue 
thus:  — If  a  man  in  one  character  (his  avowed  character, 
suppose,  of  Francis)  uses  a  word  in  some  peculiar  sense, 
or  in  some  very  irregular  manner,  then  it  will  become 
high  argument  against  this  man  as  liable  to  the  suspicion 
of  having  been  the  masque  in  the  assumed  character  of 
Junius,  that  this  masque  shall  also  be  proved  to  have  used 
the  same  word  in  the  same  anomalous  way.  Suppose 
now  that  any  ordinary  presumption,  or  any  coincidence  of 
ordinary  force  shall  be  considered  =.  x ;  then  I  may  be 
entitled  to  value  this  remarkable  coincidence  in  anomalous 
practice  as  ;  or,  however,  as  equal  to  some  higher 
power  of  the  same  order.  But,  now,  suppose  further,  that 
Francis  has  also,  in  his  mode  of  correcting  '  proof-sheets  ' 
and  '  revises '  from  the  press,  fallen  into  a  constant  mis- 
conception of  the  function  assigned  by  compositors  to  a 
particular  mark  ;  and  suppose  that  this  misconception  is 
by  no  means  a  natural  or  obvious  misconception,  but  one 
tvhich  rests  upon  some  accident  of  individual  blundering  ; 
ihen  I  should  say  that  if,  upon  examination  pursued 
through  a  multitude  of  specimens,  it  comes  out  flagrantly 
that  Junius  has  also  fallen  into  the  same  very  peculiar  and 
unohvious  error ;  in  this  case,  we  have  a  presumption  for 
the  identity  of  the  two  characters,  Francis  and  Junius, 
which  (taken  separately)  is  entitled  to  be  valued  as  a  high 
function  of  a:.  But  I  say  further  that  a  second  presumption 
ftf  the  same  order  may  lawfully  demand  to  be  reckoned 


630 


LITEBART  REMINISCENCES. 


as  multiplying  its  own  value  into  tlie  second  value. 
Meantime  the  tendency  of  all  the  external  arguments 
drawn  from  circumstantial  or  personal  considerations,  from 
local  facts,  or  the  records  of  party,  flows  in  the  very  same 
channel  ;  with  all  the  internal  presumptions  derived  from 
the  style,  from  the  anomalous  use  of  words,  from  the 
anomalous  construction  of  the  syntax,  from  the  pecu- 
liar choice  of  images,  from  the  arbitrary  use  of  the 
technical  short-hand  for  correcting  typographical  errors, 
from  capricious  punctuation,  and  even  from  penmanship, 
(which,,  of  itself,  taken  separately,  has  sometimes  deter- 
mined the  weightiest  legal  interests.)  Proofs,  in  fact, 
rush  upon  us  more  plentiful  than  blackberries  :  and  the 
case  ultimately  begins  to  be  fatiguing,  from  the  very 
plethora  and  riotous  excess  of  evidence.  It  would  stimu- 
late attention  more,  and  pique  the  interest  of  curiosity 
more  pungently,  if  there  were  some  conflicting  evidence, 
some  shadow  of  presumptions  against  Francis.  But  there 
are  none,  absolutely  none. 

Under  these  circumstances,  the  reader  will  begin  to 
say,  How  came  it  then  that  the  controversy  about  Junius, 
which  has  raged  for  upwards  of  half  a  century,  and  has 
already  produced  books  and  pamphlets  past  all  numbering, 
(insomuch  that  I  have  heard  of  several  persons  projecting 
a  Bihliotheca  Juniana,  or  Museum  Junianum  ;)  how  came 
it,  the  reader  will  ask,  that  this  controversy  did  not  drop 
at  once  and  for  ever,  as  a  question  summarily  but  irrever- 
sibly decided,  as  a  balloon  from  which  all  the  inflating  air 
had  suddenly  escapsd  ?  How  is  it  that  we  still  see  the  old 
Junian  pompholyx,  that  ancient  and  venerable  bubble,  still 
floating  in  the  upper  air  ?  This  may  be  explained  out  of 
hvo  facts:  one  being,  that  very  few  people  have  made 
themselves  familiar  with  the  arguments.  I  have  never 
yet  happened  to  meet  anybody  who  had  mastered  th,^ 


JUNIUS. 


631 


investigation  so  far  as  to  be  aware  that  there  was  an)'thing 
more  made  oat  against  Sir  Philip  Francis  than  some  vague 
presumptions,  founded  on  similarity  of  handwritings,  and 
perhaps  some  coincidence  between  the  main  periods  of 
Junius  as  to  his  rise  and  setting,  with  certain  known  criti- 
cal incidents  in  the  career  of  Francis.  The  coherence 
and  interdependency  in  the  total  chainwork  of  evidence, 
and  the  independent  strength  of  each  particular  link,  is 
little  known  to  the  public.  That  is  one  reason  for  the 
non-decisiveness  of  this  most  decisive  book.  A  second 
is,  the  absurd  tradition,  which  has  taken  root  in  the  public 
mind,  that  some  all-superseding  revelation  is  to  be  made 
upon  this  subject  at  the  death  of  some  Pitt  or  Grenville 
unknown.  For  many  a  year  it  was  asserted,  every  six 
months,  in  the  newspapers,  that  Lord  Grenville  was  the 
man  at  whose  death  a  final  discovery  was  to  be  made, 
such  as  nobody  could  gainsay.  And  to  this  day,  though 
the  Duke  of  Buckingham,  Lord  Grenville,  and  every 
other  person  of  that  generation  in  the  Pitt  and  Grenville 
families,  has  died  and  '  made  no  sign,'  the  same  ridiculous 
legend  is  occasionally  repeated  in  the  newspapers.  But 
the  best  possible  answer  to  this  idle  fable  is,  simply,  to 
ask  a  man  for  one  moment's  reflection  upon  its  meaning  ; 
for  what  is  it  that  any  man  could  establish  by  his  death, 
or  by  any  act  consequent  upon  his  death,  such  as  a  will 
or  codicil  to  a  will  ?  Livings  perhaps  Lord  Grenville 
might  have  argued  the  case  with  Mr.  Taylor  upon  the 
basis  of  his  own  recollections ;  but,  being  dead,  what 
more  could  he  possibly  do  than  leave  behind  him  a 
writing,  certificate,  or  memorial,  that  somebody  had  told 
him  he  was  Junius,  or  that  he  had  personal  reasons  for 
suspecting  that  sucn  or  such  a  person  might  be  Junius  ? 
So  that  the  utmost  result  would  have  been  to  make  out 
some  rival  case.    A  third  reason  is  the   same  wliich 


632 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


influenced  Mr.  Woodfall :  this  gentleman  having  long 
cherished  tb<3  idea,  an  idea  encouraged  by  various  arti- 
fices on  the  part  of  Junius,  that  the  masqued  wiiter  was 
a  very  great  man,  some  leading  statesman,  it  mortified 
him,  and  threw  a  coloring  of  the  burlesque  upon  the 
aristocrat' 3  airs  of  Junius,  to  suppose  him,  after  all,  no 
more  than  a  clerk  in  the  War-Office.  These  are  the 
common  reasons  for  the  non-satisfaction  (dissatisfaction 
it  cannot  be  called)  of  most  men  with  the  case  as  it  stands 
in  popular  repute.  But  there  is  a  fourth  reason,  stronger 
than  all  the  rest,  which  weighs  much  with  many  even  of 
those  who  have  some  personal  acquaintance  with  the 
evidence,  and  (so  far  as  that  acquaintance  goes)  are  not 
dissatisfied  with  its  force.  It  is  this,  and  I  have  once 
stated  it  at  length  in  a  private  letter  to  Mr.  Taylor  ;  and 
singular  enough  it  will  be  thought,  that  this  objection  to 
the  evidence  turns  out,  when  probed,  its  very  strongest 
confirmation.    Thus  it  stands  ;  — 

People  allege  that  Sir  Philip  Francis  was  a  vain  man, 
fond  of  notoriety,  and,  beyond  all  things,  fond  of  literary 
notoriety  ;  and  yet  he  never  unmasked  himself  as  Junius, 
never  hinted  at  any  interest  which  he  had  in  these  thrice 
celebrated  letters ;  and,  at  length,  when  the  claim  is  made 
on  his  behalf  by  a  stranger,  he  not  only  does  not  come 
forward  to  countersign  this  claim  as  authentic,  but  abso- 
utely,  with  some  sternness,  appears  to  disavow  it.  How 
.5  this  ?  Here  lies  a  glittering  trophy ;  a  derelict,  exposed 
in  the  public  highway.  People  have  been  known  to 
violate  their  consciences,  under  the  most  awful  circum- 
stances, in  order  to  establish  a  false  pretension  to  it ; 
people  have  actually  died  with  a  falsehood  on  their  lips, 
for  the  poor  chance  of  gaining  what,  for  iliem^  could  be 
no  more  than  a  posthumous  reputation ;  and  this  to  be 
enjoyed  tven  in  its  visionary  foretaste,  only  for  a  fe-w 


JUNITTS. 


633 


fleeting  moments  of  life,  with  a  certainty  of  present 
guilt,  and  at  the  hazard  of  future  exposure.  All  this 
has  been  done  by  those  who  are  conscious  of  having 
only  a  false  claim.  And  here  is. the  man  who,  by  the 
supposition,  has  the  true  claim ;  a  man,  too,  eminently 
vain-glorious ;  and  yet  he  will  not  put  forth  his  hand  to 
appropriate  the  prize  ;  nay,  positively  rejects  it.  Such  is 
the  objection,  Now,  hear  the  answer  —  First,  he  did  not 
reject  it.  The  place  in  which  he  is  supposed  to  have  done 
so,  is  a  short  letter  addressed  to  Sir  Richard  Phillips,  by 
way  of  answer  to  a  very  impertinent  demand,  on  that 
worthy  publisher's  part,  for  a  categorical  answer  to  the 
question  —  Was  Ae,  or  was  he  not,  Junius  ?  Now,  Sir 
Philip  seems  to  say  —  '  No  :  '  and  he  certainly  framed  his 
letter  with  a  view  to  be  so  understood.  But,  on  a  nicer 
inspection  of  this  answer,  we  may  perceive  that  it  is  most 
jesuitically  adapted  to  convey  an  impression  at  variance 
with  the  strict  construction  which  lurks  in  the  literal 
wording.  Even  that  artifice,  however,  lets  us  behind  the 
scenes,  by  showing  that  Sir  Philip  had  a  masqued  design 
before  him — a  design  to  evade  an  acknowledgment  which, 
in  conscience,  he  could  not  boldly  and  blankly  refute, 
and  which,  by  vanity,  he  longed  to  establish.  Yet,  had 
his  been  otherwise,  had  he  even  pointedly  and  unambig- 
uously said  iVo,  we  could  not,  in  the  circumstances  of  the 
case,  have  built  much  upon  that.  For  we  know,  and 
Sir  Philip  knew,  what  had  been  Dr.  Johnson's  casuistry, 
\pplied  to  this  very  case  of  Junius.  Burke  having  been 
named,  improbably  enough,  as  Junius,  the  Doctor  said 
'  No : '  he  acquitted  Burke  altogether ;  not  because  he  had 
disowned  the  authorship  ;  for  that  he  had  a  right  to  do, 
tven  if  really  Junius  ;  since,  if  veracity  could  be  supposed 
%ny  duty  in  such  a  case,  then  it  was  idle,  from  the  first, 
lo  assume  a  masque ;   a  masque  that  would  be  at  th« 


634 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


mercy  of  the  first  person  who  chose  to  go  beyond  others 
in  impertinence.  Surely  impertinence  ought  to  create  no 
special  right  over  another  man's  secret.  And,  therefore, 
along  with  the  disguise,  any  sensible  man  must  be  pre- 
sumed to  take  up  the  privilege  of  saying  '  No,*  as  one 
essential  accessory  and  adjunct  to  that  disguise.  But, 
argued  Johnson,  Burke  volunteered  the  disavowal;  made 
it  spontaneously,  when  nobody  questioned  him.  Being, 
therefore  not  called  on  for  this  as  a  measure  of  defence, 
on  that  ground  I  hold  him  to  have  spoken  the  truth  in 
disavowing  Junius.  This  defence  of  a  prudential  untruth, 
in  a  case  supposed,  was  well  known  to  Francis.  Armed 
with  this  authoritative  sanction.  Sir  Pnilip  —  a  mere  lax 
man  of  the  world  —  would  readily  have  resorted  to  a 
falsehood,  even  in  a  case  no  stronger  than  Dr.  Johnson's 
casuistry  supposed.  But,  in  fact,  as  we  shall  see,  his 
was  a  great  deal  stronger  ;  so  that,  d  fortiori,  he  had 
the  doctor's  permission  to  make  the  boldest  denial ;  and 
such  a  denial  we  should,  in  such  a  case,  be  entitled  to 
hold  as  none  at  all.  And  yet,  after  all,  he  only  allows 
himself  an  apparent  denial ;  one  which  depends,  for  its 
effect,  upon  the  haste  and  inaccuracy  of  the  reader. 

What  then  was  the  case  of  Sir  Philip,  which  I  affirm  to 
be  so  much  stronger  than  that  which  had  been  contem- 
plated by  Dr.  Johnson,  as  a  case  justifying  a  denial  of  the 
truth  ?  It  w^as  this  :  Sir  Philip  Francis  was  the  creature 
of  Jimiius,  Whatever  Sir  Philip  had  —  his  wealth,  his 
honors,  his  consideration,  were  owing  to  the  letters  of 
Junius ;  to  the  power  which  he  had  obtained  under  that 
signature  ;  and  to  the  mode  in  which,  having  obtained 
power  like  a  thief,  he  had  sold  it  like  a  traitor.  Armed 
with  that  potent  spell,  he  had  made  himself,  first,  formi- 
dable to  the  King  and  to  his  Cabinet ;  secondly,  had 
Drought  himself,  when  thus  armed,  into  the  market  for 


JUNIUS.  635 

lale.  But  how  ?  By  what  means  ?  I  answer :  By  the 
blackest  treachery ;  by  a  double  treachery  ;  by  treachery 
as  respected  the  way  in  which  he  rose  into  Junius ;  and 
by  an  equal  treachery  to  his  own  principles,  as  Junius,  in 
his  mode  of  laying  down  that  character.  How  is  it,  do 
we  suppose,  that  Junius  had  won  the  national  ear  ?  Not 
by  the  means  (generally  presumed)  of  fine  composition. 
No :  but  by  the  reputation  he  enjoyed  of  having  won  the 
ear  of  the  King's  government.  And  he  had  so  ;  it  was  no 
false  reputation.  But  again  I  say,  in  this  case  also, 
How?  If  the  public  could  be  won  by  such  tinkling 
music,  is  any  man  childish  enough  to  suppose  that  the 
care-laden  Ministers  of  a  great  nation,  overwhelmed  by 
business,  would  find  leisure  to  read  Cato  or  Puhlicola, 
purely  for  the  value  of  their  style  or  their  tropes  ?  No  : 
the  true  cause  was,  that  Ministers  found,  in  these  letters, 
proofs  of  some  enemy,  some  spy,  being  amongst  them. 
Did  they  join  the  popular  cry  —  'Here  is  a  great  rheto- 
rician?' Never  believe  it;  but,  'Here  is  a  great  thief.' 
Not  the  eloquence,  but  the  larceny,  moved  their  anxieties. 
State  secrets  were  betrayed.  Francis  was  the  spy.  He 
picked  Lord  Barrington's  locks ;  he  practised  daily  as  an 
eavesdropper  upon  Lord  Barrington's  private  communica- 
tions with  Ministers  :  he  abused,  for  his  own  purposes,  the 
information,  select  and  secret,  which  often  came  before 
him  officially,  in  his  character  of  clerk  at  the  War-Office. 
In  short,  he  was  an  unfaithful  servant,  who,  first  of  all, 
built  himself  up  into  terror  and  power  as  Junius,  on  a 
thorough-going  plan  of  disloyalty  to  his  patron,  and  after- 
war(^s  built  himself  up  into  the  Right  Honorable  Sir  Philip 
Francis,  Knight  of  the  Bath,  Privy  Councillor,  one  of  the 
Supreme  Council  in  Bengal,  with  £12,000  per  annum; 
kA  this  upon  a  disloyalty  equally  deliberate  to  all  the 
principles  and  the  patriotism  which  he  had  professed  a« 


636 


LITEKARY  REMINISCENCES. 


Junias  The  first  perfidy  would  only  have  put  a  gay 
feather  into  his  cap ;  this  he  improved  into  a  second, 
which  brought  him  place,  honor,  *  troops  of  friends,'  this 
world's  wealth,  in  short,  and  every  mode  of  prosperity  but 
one ;  which  one  was  peace  of  mind  and  an  unclouded 
conscience.  Such  was  the  brief  abstract  of  Sir  Philip's 
history.  Now,  though  most  men  would  not,  yef  there 
were  still  surviving  very  many  who  would,  upon  any 
direct  avowal  that  he  was  Junius,  at  once  put  '  this '  and 
•  that '  together,  and,  in  one  moment  of  time,  come  to 
unlock  what  had  always  been  something  of  a  mystery  to 
Mr.  Francis's  friends  at  home  —  viz.  how  it  was  that  he, 
the  obscure  clerk  of  the  War-Office,  notoriously  upon  bad 
terms  with  Lord  Barrington,  his  principal,  had,  neverthe- 
less, shot  up  all  at  once  into  a  powerful  Oriental  satrap. 
The  steps,  the  missing  gradation,  would  suddenly  be 
recovered,  and  connected  into  a  whole.  '  Thou  hast  it, 
Cawdor ! '  The  metamorphosis  of  Francis  into  the  Ben- 
gal potentate  was  unintelligible  :  but  the  intermediation 
of  Junius  would  harmonize  all  difficulties.  Thus  grew 
Francis  the  clerk  into  Junius,  (viz.  by  treason.)  Thus 
grew  Junius  the  demagogue  into  Francis  the  Rajah,  viz. 
by  selling  his  treason.  '  You  are  Junius  ?  '  it  would  be 
said  :  '  Why,  then,  you  are  a  very  brilliant  fellow.'  That 
would  be  the  first  reflection ;  but  then  would  come  a 
second  on  the  heels  of  that :  —  *  And  a  most  unprincipled 
knave,  who  rose  into  great  consideration  by  filching  his 
master's  secrets,' 

Here,  then,  we  read  the  true  secret  of  his  chicanery  in 
replymg  to  Sir  R.  Phillips.  Had  he  been  thoroughly 
determined  to  disavow  Junius,  could  he  have  brought  his 
heart  to  do  so,  we  may  be  sure  that  he  would  not  have 
needed  (Junius  would  have  known  how  to  find  clear 
language)  to  speak  so  obscurely  as  he  has  done  in  thi« 


JUNIUS. 


637 


siicrt  reply.  Neither  would  he  have  contented  himself 
with  any  simple  deniul ;  he  would  have  recited  some 
facts  in  his  life  circumstantiating  his  denial.  But  thig 
was  not  in  his  power  to  do;  nor  did  he  sincerely  wish 
it.  Naturally  he  must  have  clung,  with  a  perfect  rapture 
of  vanity,  to  his  own  too  famous  production.  Respect 
for  his  own  character  forbade  him  tc  avow  it.  Parental 
vanity  forbade  him  so  to  disavow  it,  as  that  he  could 
nevei  have  reclaimed  it.  Sir  Philip  Francis  had  been  a 
great  criminal ;  but  his  crime  produced  its  own  intolerable 
punishment.  The  tantalization  of  his  heart  when  denied 
the  privilege,  open  to  every  other  human  being,  of  claim- 
ing the  products  of  his  own  brain  and  of  his  own  exces- 
sive *  labor,  must  have  been  a  perpetual  martyrdom. 
And,  in  this  statement  of  the  case,  we  read  a  natural 
solution  of  two  else  inexplicable  facts :  first,  why  Sir  P. 
Francis  (supposing  him  Junius)  did  not  come  forward  to 
claim  his  work.  And,  secondly,  why  Junius,  the  mys- 
terious Junius,  old  '  Nominis  umhra^^  (supposing  him 
Francis,)  did  not  come  forward  to  proclaim  his  own  name. 
To  presume  Francis  and  Junius  one  and  the  same  person, 
at  once  explains  both  mysteries.  Upon  the  Taylorian 
hypothesis,  all  is  made  clear  as  daylight  why  Junius  did 
not  avow  his  name  —  why  Francis  did  not  claim  his 
literary  honors.  Upon  such  an  account  only  is  it  possible 
to  explain  the  case.  All  other  accounts  leave  it  a  per- 
petual mystery,  unfathomable  upon  any  principles  of 
human  nature,  why  Junius  did  not,  at  least,  make  his 
claim  oy  means  of  some  last  will  and  testament.  We 
canno :  imagine  that  a  writer,  evidently  under  the  most 

*  *  His  own  excessive  labor ; '  —  *  Is  there  no  labor  in  these  let- 
ters ? '  asks  Junius,  in  a  tone  of  triumphant  appeal.  And,  on  other 
occasions,  he  insists  upon  the  vast  toil  which  the  composition  cost 
Vim. 


638 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


intense  worldly  influences  of  vain-glory  and  ambition, 
should  voluntarily  have  made  a  sacrifice  (and  a  sacrifice 
with  no  apparent  motive)  of  what,  in  the  pardonable 
exaggeration  of  an  author's  vanity,  must,  to  him,  havg 
appeared  one  of  the  greatest  works  in  political  as  also  in 
rhetorical  literature.  Such  an  act  of  austere  self-mortifi- 
cation is  inconceivable,  except  amongst  the  most  rapturous 
devotees  of  the  Romish  church  :  shame  only  or  fear  ^  can 
avail  to  solve  the  enigma.  But  fear,  if  at  all  admitted  as 
applicable  to  the  case,  could  not  extend  beyond  his  own 
term  of  life  :  that  motive  cannot  explain  the  silence  of  his 
last  will  and  testament.  There,  at  least,  he  would  have 
spoken  out  to  posterity,  and  his  own  surviving  compatriots. 
'  If  I  live,'  says  he,  in  his  Dedication  to  the  People  of 
England,  '  you  shall  often  hear  of  me.'  And,  doubtless, 
even  in  dying,  if  he  forgot  them^  he  would  remember 
himself  and  his  own  really  memorable  pretensions.  He 
would  not  forget,  at  least,  to  order  some  inscription  on 
his  own  grave,  pointing  backwards  to  the  gay  trophies  of 
him  who  had  extorted  fear  from  kings,  and  admiration 
from  angry  senates.f  This  he  would  have  done  :  this  he 
has  not  done ;  and  a  principle  of  shame  only,  operating  in 
the  way  I  have  mentioned,  is  a  case  capable  of  explaining 
it.    That  case  is  precisely  the  case  of  Sir  Philip  Francis. 

*  '  Fear ; '  —  *  Sir  William  would  meet  me  in  the  field  :  others 
would  assassinate.'  —  Junius  to  Sir  Wm.  Draper, 

*  *  He  would  not  have  forgotten,  at  least,  to  order  some  inscrip- 
tion on  his  own  grave,''  &c.  Accordingly,  there  is  in  The  Anti- 
Jacobin  Review,  a  story  told  of  a  stranger  dying  at  a  village  inn, 
Bomewhere,  I  think,  in  Buckinghamshire,  and  directing  that  no 
memorial  should  be  placed  upon  his  grave,  beyond  the  initial  letters 
of  his  name,  and  the  motto  of  Junius,  ^Stat  nominis  umbra.*  S« 
much  weight  was  attached  to  the  story,  that  Charles  Fox  is  said  U 
Vave  -visited  his  grave.    Probablv  the  whole  is  a  fiction. 


JUNIUS. 


639 


It  remaiDS  only  to  say,  that,  by  neglecting  to  press  these 
Tacts  and  their  natural  construction  against  Sir  Philip^ 
Mr.  Taylor  allowed  the  only  powerful  argument  against 
his  hypothesis  to  stand  unanswered.  A  motive  of  kind- 
ness towards  the  unhappy  Sir  Philip  himself,  and  consider- 
ation for  the  pious  feelings  of  his  son  and  daughter,  may 
have  influenced  Mr.  Taylor  in  this  forbearance.  All  are 
now  dead  ;  and  these  restraints  can  operate  no  longer. 
But  even  in  the  lifetime  of  the  parties,  surely  enough 
might  have  been  hinted  to  maintain  the  impregnability  of 
the  hypothesis,  without  seriously  wounding  the  sensibili- 
ties of  Sir  Philip.  These  sensibilities  merited  respect ; 
inasmuch,  as  though  pointing  to  a  past  chapter  of  deep 
criminality,  it  is  not  impossible  that  they  had  long  con- 
nected themselves  with  virtuous  feelings  of  remorse,  and 
a  suffering  sense  of  honor  ;  most  assuredly  they  brought 
along  with  them  the  bitterest  chastisement,  by  that  un- 
exampled self-sacrifice  which  they  entailed.  But  all  this 
might  have  been  met  and  faced  by  Mr.  Taylor :  the 
reader  might  have  been  summoned  in  general  terms, 
before  allowing  an  unnecessary  weight  to  the  fact  of  Sir 
Philip's  apparent  renunciation  of  the  claim  made  on  his 
behalf,  to  consider  two  capital  points  ;  first,  whether  he 
really  had  renounced  it,  and  in  such  terms  as  admitted  of 
no  equivocal  construction  ;  secondly,  whether  (even  sup- 
posing him  to  have  done  this  in  the  amplest  sense,  and 
with  no  sort  of  reserve)  there  might  not  appear  some 
circumstances  in  the  past  recital  of  Sir  Philip's  connection 
with  the  War-Office  and  Lord  Barrington,  which  would 
forcibly  restrain  him  in  old  age,  when  clothed  with  high 
state  characters,  of  senator  and  privy  counsellor,  invested 
therefore  with  grave  obligations  of  duty ;  I  say,  restrain 
him  from  seeming,  by  thus  assuming  the  imputed  author- 
*thip,  to  assume,  along  with  it,  the  responsibility  attaching 


640 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES 


to  certain  breaches  of  confidence,  which  the  temptations 
of  ambition,  and  the  ardor  of  partisanship,  might  palli^ite 
in  a  young  man,  but  which  it  would  not  become  an 
old  one  to  adopt  and  own,  under  any  palliations  whatever, 
or  upon  any  temptations  of  literary  gain.  Such  an 
appeal  as  this  could  not  greatly  have  distressed  Sir  Philip 
Francis,  or  not  more,  however,  than  he  had  already  been 
distressed  by  the  inevitable  disclosures  of  the  investiga- 
tion itself,  as  connected  with  the  capital  thesis  of  Mr. 
Taylor,  that  Francis  and  Junius  were  the  self- same 
person. 

Here,  therefore,  was  a  great  oversight  of  Mr.  Taylor  ; 
and  over  the  results  of  this  oversight  —  his  discoveries  — 
the  unconquerable  points  of  his  exposure  have  not  yet 
established  their  victory.  I  may,  mention,  however,  that 
Sir  Philip  so  far  dallied  with  the  gratification  offered  to 
his  vanity  in  this  public  association  of  his  name  with 
Junius  as  to  call  upon  Mr.  Taylor.  His  visit  seemed 
partly  a  sort  of  tentative  measure,  adopted  in  a  spirit  of 
double  uncertainty  —  uncertainty  about  the  exact  quantity 
of  proof  that  Mr.  Taylor  might  have  accumulated  ;  and 
uncertaiUjty  again,  about  the  exact  temper  of  mind  in 
which  it  became  him  to  receive  the  new  discoveries.  He 
affected  to  be  surprised  that  anybody  should  ever  have 
thought  of  him  in  connection  with  Junius.  Now,  possi- 
bly, this  was  a  mere  careless  expression,  uttered  simply 
by  way  of  an  introduction  to  the  subsequent  conversation. 
Else,  and  if  it  were  said  deliberately,  it  showed  great 
weakness  ;  for,  assuredly,  Sir  Philip  was  too  much  a  man 
of  shrewd  sagacity  to  fail  in  perceiving  that,  were  it  even 
possible  for  presumptions,  so  many  and  so  strong,  to  be, 
after  all,  compatible  with  final  falsehood,  still  a  case  had 
been  made  out  far  too  strong  for  any  man  unaffectedly  to 
;wetend  surprise  at  its  winning  some  prima  facie  credit. 


rumvs. 


641 


Mr  Taylor  naturally  declined  re-arguing  the  case  ;  he 
resigned  it  to  its  own  merits,  which  must  soon  dispose  ol 
it  in  public  estimation,  but  at  the  same  time  protested 
against  having  viewed  his  discovery  in  any  other  light 
than  that  of  honor  to  Sir  Philip  ;  indeed,  in  a  literary 
sense,  who  would  not  be  honored  (he  asked)  by  the 
imputation  of  being  Junius  ?  So  closed  the  conversation 
substantially  on  the  respondent's  part.  But  the  appellant, 
Sir  Philip,  gave  a  singular  turn  to  his  part,  which  thus  far 
had  been  rather  to  him  a  tone  of  expostulation,  by  saying 
in  conclusion  — 

'  Well,  at  least,  I  think,  you  can  do  no  less  than  send 
ftie  a  copy  of  your  book.' 

This,  of  course,  was  done ;  and,  with  some  slight 
interchange  of  civilities  attending  the  transmission  of  the 
book,  I  believe  the  intercourse  terminated. 

Sir  Philip  suffered  under  a  most  cruel  disease,  which 
soon  put  an  end  to  his  troubled  life  ;  and  my  own  belief 
is,  that  there  ended  as  agitated  an  existence  as  can  have 
been  supported  by  frail  humanity.  He  was  naturally  a 
man  of  bad  and  harsh  disposition  ;  insolent,  arrogant,  and 
ill-tempered.  Constitutionally,  he  was  irritable  ;  bodily 
sufferings  had  exasperated  the  infirmities  of  his  temper  ; 
and  the  mixed  agony  of  body  and  mind  in  which  he 
passed  his  latter  years,  must  have  been  fearful  even  to 
contemplate.  The  Letters  of  Junius  certainly  show  very 
little  variety  or  extent  of  thought ;  no  comprehensive 
grasp  ;  no  principles  of  any  kind,  false  or  sound  ;  no 
powers,  in  fact,  beyond  the  powers  of  sarcasm  ;  but  they 
have  that  sort  of  modulated  rhythm,  and  that  ali  of  clas- 
sical chastity,  (perhaps  arising  more  from  the  penury  of 
ornament,  and  the  absence  of  any  impassioned  eloquence, 
,han  from  any  positive  causes,)  which,  co-operating  with 
ihe  shortness  of  the  periods,  and  the  unparalleled  felicitj 
41 


642 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


of  their  sarcasms,  would,  at  any  rate,  have  conciliated 
the  public  notice.  They  have  exactly  that  sort  of  talen«N 
which  the  owner  is  sure  to  overrate.  But  the  inten- 
sity, the  sudden  growth,  and  the  durability  ^'  of  their 
fame,  were  due,  (as  I  must  ever  contend,)  not  to  any 
qualities  of  style  or  composition  —  though,  doubtless, 
these  it  is  which  co-operated  with  the  thick  cloak  of 
mystery,  to  sustain  a  reputation  once  gained  —  but  to  the 
knowledge  dispersed  through  London  society,  that  the 
Government  had  been  appalled  by  Junius,  as  one  who, 
in  some  way  or  other,  had  possessed  himself  of  their 
secrets. 

The  London  Magazine^  of  whose  two  publishers  (editors 
also)  I  have  thus  introduced  to  the  reader  that  one  who 
had  also  distinguished  himself  as  an  author,  was  at  that 
time  brilliantly  supported.  And  strange  it  is,  and  also  has 
been  to  others  as  well  as  myself,  that  such  a  work  should 
not  have  prospered  ;  but  prosper  it  did  not.  Meantime, 
the  following  writers  were,  in  1821—23,  amongst  my  own 
collahorateurs  :  —  Charles  Lamb;  Hazlitt;  Allan  Cunning- 
ham ;  Hood  ;  Hamilton  Reynolds  ;  Carey,  the  unrivalled 
translator  of  Dante  ;  Crow,  the  Public  Orator  of  Oxford. 
And  so  well  were  all  departments  provided  for,  that  even 
the  monthly  abstract  of  politics,  brief  as  it  necessarily 
was,  had  been  confided  to  the  care  of  Phillips,  the  cele- 
brated Irish  barrister.  Certainly  a  literary  Pleiad  might 
have  been  gathered  out  of  the  stars  connected  with  this 
journal ;  and  others  there  were,  I  believe,  occasional  con- 

*  *  The  durability &c.  —  It  is,  however,  remarkable  that,  since 
the  great  expansion  of  the  public  mind  by  political  discussions  conse- 
quent upon  the  Reform  Bill,  Junius  is  no  longer  found  a  saleabli 
oook  ;  so,  at  least,  I  have  heard  from  various  persons 


CLA  RE. 


643 


tributors,  who  could  not  be  absolutely  counted  upon,  and 
therefore  I  do  not  mention  them.  One,  however,  who 
joined  The  London  in  1823,  I  think,  calls  for  a  separate 
mention  —  namely,  Clare,  the  peasant  poet  of  Northamp- 
tonshire. 

Our  Scottish  brethren  are  rather  too  apt,  in  the  excess 
of  that  nationality,  (which,  dying  away  in  some  classes, 
is  still  burning  fervently  in  others,)  and  which,  though 
giving  a  just  right  of  complaint  to  those  who  suffer  by 
it,  and  though  direfully  disfiguring  the  liberality  of  the 
national  manners,  yet  stimulates  the  national  rivalship 
usefully ;  —  our  Scottish  brethren,  I  say,  are  rather  too 
apt  to  talk  as  if,  in  Scotland  only,  there  were  any  prece- 
dents to  be  found  of  intellectual  merit  struggling  upwards 
in  the  class  of  rustic  poverty.  Whereas  there  has,  in 
England,  been  a  larger  succession  of  such  persons  than 
in  Scotland.  Inquire,  for  instance,  as  to  the  proportion 
of  those  who  have  risen  to  distinction  by  mere  weight  of 
unassisted  merit,  in  this  present  generation,  at  the  English 
bar ;  and  then  inquire  as  to  the  corresponding  proportion 
at  the  Scotch  bar.  Oftentimes  it  happens  that,  in  the 
poetry  of  this  class,  little  more  is  found  than  the  gift  of  a 
tolerable  good  ear  for  managing  the  common  metres  of 
the  language.  B'lt  in  Clare  it  was  otherwise.  His  poems 
wer3  not  the  mere  reflexes  of  his  reading.  He  had  studied 
for  himself  in  the  fields,  and  in  the  woods,  and  by  the 
side  of  brooks.  I  very  much  doubt  if  there  could  be 
found,  in  his  poems,  a  single  commonplace  image,  or  a 
description  made  up  of  hackneyed  elements.  In  that  re- 
spect, his  poems  are  original,  and  have  even  a  separate 
value,  as  a  sort  of  calendar  (in  extent,  of  course,  a  very 
limited  one)  of  many  rural  appearances,  of  incidents  in 
»he  fields  not  elsewhere  noticed,  and  of  the  loveliest  flow- 
ers most  felicitously  described.    The  description  is  often 


644 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


true  even  to  a  botanical  eye  ;  and  Li  that,  perhaps,  lies 
the  chief  defect ;  not  properly  in  the  scientific  accuracy, 
but  taat,  in  searching  after  this  too  earnestly,  the  feeling 
is  sometimes  too  much  neglected.  However,  taken  as  a 
whole,  his  poems  have  a  very  novel  quality  of  merit, 
though  a  quality  too  little,  I  fear,  in  the  way  of  public 
notice.  Messrs.  Taylor  &  Hessey  had  been  very  kind  to 
him ;  and,  through  them,  the  late  Lord  Fitzwilliam  had 
settled  an  annuity  upon  him.  In  reality,  the  annuity  had 
been  so  far  increased,  I  believe,  by  the  publishers,  as  to 
release  him  from  the  necessities  of  daily  toil.  He  had 
thus  his  time  at  his  own  command;  and,  in  1824,  perhaps 
upon  some  literary  scheme,  he  came  up  to  London,  where, 
by  a  few  noble  families  and  by  his  liberal  publishers,  he 
was  welcomed  in  a  way  that,  I  fear,  from  all  I  heard, 
would  but  too  much  embitter  the  contrast  with  his  own 
humble  opportunities  of  enjoyment  in  the  country.  The 
contrast  of  Lord  Radstock's  brilliant  parties,  and  the 
glittering  theatres  of  London,  would  have  but  a  poor 
effect  in  training  him  to  bear  that  want  of  excitement 
which  even  already,  I  had  heard,  made  his  rural  life  but 
too  insupportable  to  his  mind.  It  is  singular  that  what 
most  fascinated  his  rustic  English  eye,  was  not  the  gor* 
geous  display  of  English  beauty,  but  the  French  st)''le  of 
beauty,  as  he  saw  it  amongst  the  French  actresses  in 
Tottenham  Court  Road.  He  seemed,  however,  oppressed 
by  the  glare  and  tumultuous  existence  of  London ;  and 
oeing  ill  at  the  time,  from  an  affection  of  the  liver,  which 
did  not,  of  course,  tend  to  improve  his  spirits,  he  threw  a 
weight  of  languor  upon  any  attempt  to  draw  him  out  into 
conversation.  One  thing,  meantime,  was  very  honorable 
to  him,  that  even  in  this  season  of  dejection,  he  would 
uniformly  become  animated  when  anybody  spoke  to  him 
of  Wordsworth  —  animated  with  the  most  bearty  and  al- 


ALLAN  CUNNINGHAM. 


645 


most  rapturous  spirit  of  admiration.  As  regarded  his 
own  poems,  this  admiration  seemed  to  have  an  unhappy 
effect  of  depressing  his  confidence  in  himself.  It  is  un- 
fortunate, indeed,  to  gaze  too  closely  upon  models  of 
colossal  excellence.  Compared  with  those  of  his  own 
class,  I  feel  satisfied  that  Clare  will  always  maintain  an 
honorable  place. 

Very  different,  though  originally  in  the  very  same  class 
of  rustic  laborers  and  rustic  poets,  (a  fact  which  I  need 
not  disguise,  since  he  proclaims  it  himself  upon  every 
occasion  with  a  well-directed  pride,)  is  another  of  thao 
London  society  in  1821-23,  viz.  Allan  Cunningham. 
About  this  author  I  had  a  special  interest.  I  had  read, 
and  with  much  pleasure,  a  volume  called  '  Nithisdale  and 
Galloway  Song,'  which  professed  to  contain  fugitive  poems 
of  that  country,  gathered  together  by  Mr.  Cromek,  the 
engraver ;  the  same  person,  I  believe,  who  published  a 
supplementary  volume  to  Dr.  Currie's  edition  of  Burns. 
The  whole  of  these,  I  had  heard,  were  a  forgery  by  Allan 
Cunningham ;  and  one,  at  any  rate,  was  so  —  by  far  the 
most  exquisite  gem  in  the  volume.  It  was  a  fragment  of 
only  three  stanzas ;  and  the  situation  must  be  supposed 
that  of  a  child  lying  in  a  forest  amongst  the  snow,  just 
at  the  point  of  death.  The  child  must  be  supposed  to 
ipeak :  — 

*  Gone  were  but  the  cold. 

And  gone  were  but  the  snow, 
I  could  sleep  in  the  wild  woods, 
Where  the  primroses  blow. 

*  Cold's  the  snow  at  my  head. 

And  cold 's  the  snow  at  my  feet ; 
And  the  finger  of  death 's  at  my  eres 
Closing  them  to  sleep. 


646 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


•  Let  none  tell  my  father, 

Or  my  mother  so  dear  ; 
I'll  meet  them  both  in  heaven. 
At  the  spring-time  of  the  year,' 

These  lines  of  Allan  Cunningham  (so  I  call  him,  for  go 
tie  called  himself  upon  his  visiting  cards)  had  appeared 
to  me  so  exquisite  a  breathing  of  the  pastoral  muse,  that, 
had  it  been  for  these  alone,  I  should  have  desired  to  make 
his  acquaintance.  But  I  had  also  read  some  papers  on 
gipsy  life,  embodying  several  striking  gipsy  traditions,  by 
the  same  author.  These  were  published  in  early  numbers 
of  Blackwood's  Magazine;  and  had,  apparently,  intro- 
duced situations,  and  scenes,  and  incidents,  from  the 
'personal  recollections  of  the  author.  Such  was  my  belief, 
at  least.  In  parts,  they  were  impressively  executed ;  and 
a  singular  contrast  they  afforded  to  the  situation  and 
daily  life  of  the  same  Allan,  planted  and  rooted,  as  it 
were,  amongst  London  scenery.  Allan  was  —  (what  shall 
I  say?  To  a  man  of  genius,  I  would  not  apply  the 
coarse  mercantile  term  of  foreman  ;  and  the  fact  is,  that 
he  stood  on  a  more  confidential  footing  than  is  implied 
by  that  term,  with  his  employer) — he  was  then  a  sort  of 
right-hand  man,  an  agent  equally  for  mechanical  and  for 
intellectual  purposes,  to  Chantrey  the  sculptor :  he  was 
an  agent,  also,  in  transactions  not  strictly  either  the 
one  or  the  other ;  cases  which  may  be  called,  therefore, 
mechanico-intellectual ;  or,  according  to  a  pleasant  dis- 
tinction of  Professor  Wilson's,  he  was  an  agent  for  the 
■  coarse '  arts  as  well  as  the  '  fine '  arts  ;  sometimes  in 
separation,  sometimes  in  union.  This  I  mention,  as  argu- 
ing the  versatility  of  his  powers :  few  men  beside  himself 
could  have  filled  a  station  running  through  so  large  a 
scale  of  duMos.    Accordingly,  he  measured  out  and  appor- 


ALLAN  CUNNINGHAM. 


647 


doiied  each  day's  work  to  the  several  working  sculptors 
III  Chaiitrey's  yard  :  this  was  the  most  mechanical  part  of 
his  services.  On  the  other  hand,  at  the  opposite  pole  of 
his  functions,  he  was  often  (I  helieve)  found  useful  to 
Chan  trey  as  an  umpire  in  questions  of  taste,  or,  perhaps, 
as  a  suggester  of  original  hints,  in  the  very  highest  walks 
of  the  art.  Various  indications  of  natural  disposition  for 
these  efforts,  aided  greatly,  and  unfolded  by  daily  conver- 
sation with  all  the  artists  and  amateurs  resorting  to 
Chan  trey's  studio,  will  be  found  in  his  popular  '  Lives  of 
the  Painters  and  Sculptors.'  His  particular  opinions  are, 
doubtless,  often  liable  to  question  ;  but  they  show  proof 
everywhere  of  active  and  sincere  thinking  :  and,  in  two 
of  his  leading  peculiarities,  upon  questions  of  (Esthetics, 
(to  speak  Germanice,)  I  felt  too  close  an  approach  in 
Cunningham  to  opinions  which  I  had  always  entertained 
myself,  not  to  have  been  prejudiced  very  favorably  in  his 
behalf.  They  were  these :  —  He  avowed  an  unqualified 
scorn  of  Ossian  ;  such  a  scorn  as  every  man  that  ever 
looked  at  Nature  with  his  own  eyes,  and  not  through 
books,  must  secretly  entertain.  Heavens  !  what  poverty : 
secondly,  what  monotony  :  thirdly,  what  falsehood  of 
imagery  !  Scorn,  therefore,  he  avowed  of  Ossian  ;  and, 
in  the  next  place,  scorn  of  the  insipidities  —  when  applied 
to  the  plastic  arts,  (sculpture  or  painting)  —  embalmed  by 
modern  allegory.  Britannia,  supported  by  Peace  on  one 
Bide  and  Prosperity  on  the  other,  beckons  to  Inoculation 
—  '  Heavenly  maid  '  —  and  to  Vaccination  in  the  rear, 
who,  mounted  upon  the  car  of  Liberality,  hurls  her  spear 
^it.  the  dragon  of  Small-Pox-Hospitalism,  &c.  &c.  But 
why  quote  instances  of  that  which  every  stone-cutter's 
yard  supplies  in  nauseous  prodigality  ?    These  singu 


648 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


larities  of  taste,  at  least,  speaking  of  Ossian,"^*  (for,  as  to 
allegory,  it  is  rather  tolerated  by  the  public  mind  than 
positively  approved,)  plead  thus  far  in  any  man's  favor, 
that  they  argue  a  healthy  sincerity  of  the  sensibilities,  not 
liable  to  be  duped  by  the  vague,  the  superficial,  or  the 
unreal ;  nor,  finally,  by  precedent  and  authority. 

Such  were  the  grounds  upon  which  I  looked  forward, 
with  some  pleasure,  to  my  first  interview  with  Allan 
Cunningham.  This  took  place  at  a  dinner  given  by  my 
publishers,  soon  after  the  publication  of  the  Opium 
Confessions  ;  at  which  dinner,  to  say  the  truth,  1  soon 
after  suspected  (and  with  some  vexation)  that  I  had 
myself,  unconsciously,  played  the  part  of  lion.  At  that 
time  I  was  ill,  beyond  what  any  man  would  believe,  who 
saw  me  out  of  bed  :  and,  in  the  mere  facility  of  unre- 
flecting good  nature,  I  had  consented  to  attend,  on  the 
assurance  that  '  only  a  friend  or  two '  would  be  present. 
However,  it  proved  to  be  a  general  gathering,  '  frequent 
and  full,'  of  all  the  wits,  keen  and  brilliant,  associated  in 
the  literary  journal  to  which  I  had  committed  my  earliest 
experiences.  Dinner  was  fixed  at  '  half-past  Jive,  for 
six ; '  and,  from  some  mistake,  it  happened  that  I  was 
amongst  the  earliest  arrivals.  As  an  invalid,  or,  as  the 
hero  of  the  day,  I  was  planted  inexorably,  without  retreat, 
in  the  place  of  honor  by  the  fireside  ;  for  the  month  was 
deep   November.     Judge  of  my  despair,  when  there 

*  With  respect  to  Ossian,  I  have  heard  it  urged,  by  way  of  an  argu^ 
mentum  ad  hominem,  in  arguing  the  case  with  myself,  as  a  known 
devotee  of  Wordsworth,  that  he,  Wordsworth,  had  professed  honor 
for  Ossian,  by  writing  an  epitaph  for  his  supposed  grave  in  Glen 
Almain.  By  no  means  :  Wordsworth's  fine  lines  are  not  upon  the 
pseudo-Ossian  of  Macpherson.  not  upon  the  cataphysical  one-stringed 
lutanist  of  Morven,  but  upon  Ossian,  the  hero  and  the  poet,  of  Gaelic 
j:adition.  We  scorn  the  Ossian  of  1766.  No  man  scorns  Ossian  the 
Bon  of  Finga'  of  A.  D.  366. 


ALLAN  CUNNINGHAM. 


649 


began  to  file  in  one  suspicious-looking  fellow  after 
another  ~  {suspicious  to  me  at  that  moment ;  because, 
by  the  expression  of  the  eye,  looking  all  made  up  for 
*  play,'  and  some  of  them  foi  'mischief')  —  one  after 
another,  I  say  ;  annunciation  upon  annunciation  suc- 
ceeded with  frightful  rapidity,  until  the  small  back 
drawing-room  of  our  host  began  to  overflow.  I  believe 
the  fashion  of  not  introducing  dinner  visitors  to  each 
other  was  just  then  (1821)  beginning  to  be  popular; 
either  for  that  reason,  or  not  to  overwhelm  my  weak 
spirits,  I  was  not  often  summoned  to  this  ceremony  :  but, 
on  two  or  three  more  select  arrivals,  I  loas  :  in  such  cases 
I  had  to  stand  formal  presentation  to  the  parties.  One  of 
these  was  Mr.  (no,  he  will  be  as  angry  as  O' Gorman 
Mahon  or  The  Chisholm,  if  I  say  Mr,)  Allan  Cunning- 
ham ;  and,  from  the  light  of  a  November  fire,  I  first  saw 
reflected  the  dark  flashing  guerilla  eye  of  Allan  Cunning- 
ham. Dark  it  was,  and  deep  with  meaning  ;  and  the 
meaning,  as  in  all  cases  of  expressive  eyes,  was  com- 
prehensive, and,  therefore,  equivocal.  On  the  whole, 
however,  Allan  Cunningham's  expression  did  not  belie 
his  character,  as  afterwards  made  known  to  me  :  he  was 
kind,  liberal,  hospitable,  friendly  ;  and  his  whole  natural 
disposition,  as  opposed  to  his  acquired,  was  genial  and 
fervent.  But  he  had  acquired  feelings  in  which  I,  as  an 
Englishman,  was  interested  painfully.  In  particular,  like 
BO  many  Scotsmen  of  his  original  rank,  he  had  a  preju- 
dice —  or,  perhaps,  that  is  not  the  word :  it  was  no 
feeling  that  he  had  derived  from  experience  —  it  was  an 
old  Scottish  grudge  :  not  a  feeling  taat  he  indulged  to  his 
own  private  sensibilities,  but  to  his  national  conscience  — 
a  prejudice  against  Englishmen.  He  loved,  perhaps,  this 
and  that  Englishman,  Tom  and  Jack  ;  but  he  hated  ua 
English  as  a  body  :  it  was  in  vain  to  deny  it.    As  is  the 


650 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


master,  such  is  the  company  ;  and  too  often,  in  the  kind 
and  hospitable  receptions  of  Allan  Cunningham  and  Mrs. 
Cunningham,  or  other  Scottish  families  residing  in  Lon- 
don, I  heard,  not  from  the  heads  of  the  house,  but  from 
the  visitors,  rueful  attacks  upon  us  poor  English,  and 
above  all,  upon  us,  poor  Oxonians.  Oxford  received  no 
mercy.  O  heavens  !  how  my  fingers  itched  to  be  amidst 
the  row  !  Yet,  oftentimes  I  had  no  pretext  for  intermix- 
ing in  the  dispute  —  if  dispute  it  could  be  called,  where, 
generally  speaking,  all  were  of  one  mind. 

The  fact  is  this :  —  Far  be  it  from  me  to  say  anything 
of  Mr.  Allan  Cunningham's  original  rank,  had  he  not 
taken  a  pride  (and  a  meritorious  pride)  in  asserting  it 
himself.  Now,  that  granted,  all  is  plain.  The  Scotch, 
(or,  to  please  the  fancy  of  our  Transtweedian  brethren, 
the  Scots,*)  in  the  lower  orders  of  society,  do  not  love  the 
English.  Much  I  could  say  on  this  subject,  having  lived 
in  Scotland  for  six  or  seven  years,  and  observed  closely. 
The  Scotch  often  plead  that  the  English  retaliate  this 
dislike,  and  that  no  love  is  lost.  I  think  otherwise  ;  and, 
for  the  present,  I  will  only  report  my  experience  on  last 
Sunday  night  but  one,  January  28,  1838,  in  a  coffee-room 
of  Edinburgh.  I  refer  to  a  day  so  recent,  in  order  that 
the  reader  may  understand  how  little  I  vv^ish  to  rest  upon 
any  selected  case :  the  chance  case  which  happens  to  stand 
last  in  one's  experience  may  be  presumed  to  be  a  fair 
average  case.  Now,  upon  that  evening,  two  gentlemen 
were  sitting  in  a  box  together  ;  one  of  them  an  Englishman, 
one  a  Scotchman.  High  argument  reigned  between  them. 
The  Englishman  alleged  much  and  weighty  matter,  if  it 
had  been  true,  violently  and  harshly  against  the  Scotch  : 

*  It  is  remarkable  that,  for  what  mysterious  reason  I  never  could  . 
iiscover,  thorough  Scotchmen  feel  exceedingly  angry  at  being  so  called 
demand,  for  some  cabalistif  il  cause,  to  be  entitled  Scotsmen* 


ALLAN  CUNNINGHAM. 


651 


the  Scotchman  replied  firmly,  but  not  warmly :  the  Eng- 
lishman rejoined  with  fierceness ;  both,  at  length,  rose  in  a 
Btate  of  irritation,  and  went  to  the  fire.  As  they  went, 
the  Scotchman  offered  his  card.  The  Englishman  took 
it :  and,  without  so  much  as  looking  at  it,  stuffed  it  into 
the  fire.  Upon  this,  up  started  six  gentlemen  in  a  neigh- 
boring box,  exclaiming  to  the  soi-disant  Englishman  — 
*  Sir,  you  are  a  disgrace  to  your  country  ! '  and  oftentimes 
giving  him  to  understand  that,  in  their  belief,  he  was  not 
an  Englishman.  Afterwards,  the  quarrel  advanced  :  the 
Englishman  throwing  off  his  coat,  or  making  motions  to 
do  so,  challenged  the  Scotchman  to  a  pugilistic  combat. 
The  Scotchman,  who  appeared  thoroughly  cool,  and  de- 
termined not  to  be  provoked,  persisted  in  his  original 
determination  of  meeting  his  antagonist  with  pistols,  were 
it  071  the  next  morning ;  but  steadily  declined  to  fight  on 
the  coarse  terms  proposed.  And  thus  the  quarrel  threat- 
ened to  prove  interminable.  But  how,  meantime,  did  the 
neutral  part  of  the  company  (all,  by  accident,  English- 
men) conduct  themselves  towards  their  own  countryman? 
Him  they  justly  viewed  as  the  unprovoked  aggressor,  and 
as  the  calumniator  of  Scotland,  in  a  way  that  no  provo- 
cation could  have  justified.  One  and  all,  they  rose  at 
length  ;  declared  the  conduct  of  their  countryman  in- 
sufferable ;  and  two  or  three  of  them,  separately,  offered 
their  cards,  as  willing  to  meet  him  either  on  the  next 
morning,  or  any  morning  when  his  convenience  might 
iJlow,  by  way  of  evading  any  personal  objection  he 
might  plead  to  his  original  challenger.  The  Englishman 
(possibly*  a  Scotchman)  peremptorily  declined  all  chal- 
lenges. 

*  *  Possibly  a  Scotchman^^  and  very  probably ;  for  there  are  no 
more  bitter  enemies  of  Scotland  and  Scotchmen,  and  all  things 
Bcotch,  than  banished  Scotchmen  —  who  may  be  called  renegade 


{52 


I/ITEBABY  B£MINI$C£NC£S. 


*  What !  six  or  seven  upon  one  ? ' 

*  Oh  no,  sir ! '  the  answer  was ;  not  so :  amongst  Eng« 
lishmen,  if  you  art  one,  you  must  be  well  aware  that  no 
man  meets  with  foul  play  :  any  one  of  ourselves  would 
protect  you  against  the  man  i;hat  should  offer  less  than 
fair  play  to  yourself.* 

The  libeller,  however,  intrenched  himself  in  his  deter- 
mination to  hear  of  no  pistol  warfare ;  and  hence,  though 
two  of  the  Englishmen  were  of  colossal  build,  and  well 
able  to  have  smashed  his  pugilistic  pretensions,  yet,  as 
all  but  himself  were  opposed  to  that  mode  of  fighting, 
he,  in  fact,  took  shelter  under  his  own  limited  mode  of 
offering  satisfaction.  The  others  would  not  fight  as  he, 
nor  he  as  they ;  and  thus  all  openings  being  closed  to  any 
honorable  mode  of  settling  the  dispute,  at  the  request  of 
the  company,  the  master  of  the  coffee-room,  Avith  his  long 
'  tail '  of  waiters,  advanced  to  him  with  a  quiet  demeanor, 
but  wdth  words  so  persuasive,  as  induced  him  quietly  to 
withdraw.    And  so  terminated  the  dispute. 

And  now,  let  me  ask,  Is  an  Englishman  likely  to  meet 
with  six  Scotchmen,  in  London,  starting  up  on  behalf  of 
calumniated  England  ?  O,  no  ;  painful  it  is  to  tell  of  men 
whom  we,  English,  view  as  our  brothers,  and  whose  land, 
and  institutions,  and  literature,  have  in  our  days,  been  the 
lubject  of  an  absolute  'craze,'  or,  at  all  events,  of  a  most 
generous  enthusiasm  in  England,  that  nineteen  out  of 
twenty,  among  those  who  are  of  humble  birth  and  con- 
nections, are  but  too  ready  to  join  fervently  in  abuse  of 
the  land  which  shelters  them,  and  supports  their  house- 
hold charities.    Scotchmen,  you  cannot  deny  it.  Now, 

Scotchmen.  There  is  no  enemy  like  an  old  friend;  and  many  a 
Bcotchman  (or  Scotsman  —  let  us  not  forget  thai)  remembers  EdiD* 
^argh,  Glasgow,  Aberdeen,  simply  as  the  city  that  ejected  him. 


ALLAN  CUNNINGHAM. 


you  hear  from  my  story,  which  is  not  a  fortnight  old,  how 
different,  in  the  same  circumstances,  is  the  conduct  of 
Englishmen.  All,  observe,  joined,  with  one  consent,  in 
the  ^lamo  service  —  and  there  were  six,  without  counting 
myself,  who  did  not  belong  to  either  party ;  and  not  one 
of  my  countrymen  stirred  upon  any  principle  of  selfish 
honor ;  none  had  been  wounded ;  but  upon  a  gonerous 
regard  to  the  outraged  character  of  a  country  which  at 
that  moment  was  affording  a  shelter  to  themselves,  which 
they  loved  and  honored,  and  which  was  accidentally  with- 
out a  defender. 

Would  that,  upon  such  an  impulse,  I  could  have  heard 
Allan  Cunningham  undertaking  the  defence  of  England  or 
of  Englishmen!  But  this  I  have  not  heard  from  any 
Scotchman,  excepting  only  Professor  Wilson;  and  he,  to 
show  the  natural  result  of  such  generosity,  is  taxed  with 
Anglomania  by  many  of  his  countrymen.  Allan  Cunning- 
ham offended  somewhat  in  this  point,  not  so  much  in  act, 
as  by  discovering  his  propensities.  I,  for  my  part,  quar- 
relled also  with  his  too  oriental  prostrations  before  certain 
regular  authors  —  chiefly  Sir  Walter  Scott  and  Southey. 
With  respect  to  them,  he  professed  to  feel  himself  nobody, 
in  a  way  which  no  large  estimator  of  things  as  they  are 

—  of  natural  gifts,  and  their  infinite  distribution  through 
in  infinite  scale  of  degrees,  and  the  compensating  accom- 
plishments which  take  place  in  so  vast  a  variety  of  forms 

—  could  easily  tolerate.  Allan  Cunningham  would  say  — 
'  I  don't  think  myself  worthy  to  be  accounted  an  author  in 
comparison  of  such  men  ;  *  and  this  he  would  say,  in  a 
tone  that  too  much  had  the  sound  of  including,  in  his  act 
of  prostration,  his  hearer  at  the  moment ;  who  might  very 
possibly  disdain  so  absolute  and  unlimited  an  avowal  of 
nferiority  —  a  Chinese  kotou  so  unconditional;  knowing, 
iS  know  he  must,  that  if  in  one  talent  or  one  accomplish 


654 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


tnent  he  were  much  inferior,  hopelessly  inferior,  not  the 
less  in  some  other  power,  some  other  talent,  some  other 
accomplishment,  he  might  have  a  right  to  hold  himself 
greatly  superior ;  nay,  might  have  a  right  to  say  —  that 
power  I  possess  in  some  degree ;  and  Sir  Walter  Scott  or 
Mr.  Southey  in  no  degree  whatever.  For  example  :  every 
mode  of  philosophic  power  was  denied  to  both  of  these 
authors ;  so  that  he  who  had  that  power,  in  any  degree, 
might  reasonably  demur  to  this  prostration,  performed 
before  their  images.  With  respect  to  Sir  Walter  Scott,  in 
particular,  the  homage  of  Allan  Cunningham  was  the  less 
merited,  as  Sir  Walter  had  not  treated  liim  with  the 
respect  due  to  a  man  of  so  much  original  genius  :  the  aris- 
tocratic phrase,  '  Honest  Allan,'  expressed  little  of  the 
courtesy  due  from  one  man  of  letters  to  another.  And,  in 
the  meantime,  whilst  Allan  Cunningham  was  thus  ready 
to  humble  himself  before  a  countryman  of  his  own,  who 
had  not  treated  him,  in  public,  with  the  proper  considera- 
tion, he  spoke  of  Wordsworth  [but  certainly  with  this 
excuse  —  that,  in  those  days,  he  knew  nothing  at  all  of 
his  works]  with  something  like  contempt :  in  fact,  he  had 
evidently  adopted  the  faith  of  the  wretched  journals. 
This  alienated  my  feelings  from  Cunningham,  spite  of  his 
own  kind  and  liberal  nature ;  nay,  spite  of  his  own  natural 
genius. 

One  —  opinion  shall  I  call  it,  fancy,  or  dream  —  of 
Allan  Cunningham's  is  singular  enough  to  deserve  men- 
tion :  he  maintained  that  the  Scottish  musical  airs  must 
have  an  eternal  foundation  in  nature ;  that  is  to  say,  must 
have  a  co-eternal  existence  with  the  musical  sense,  for 
che  following  most  extraordinary  reason  ;  nay,  consider- 
ing that  his  veracity  was  unimpeachable,  I  may  say 
marvellous  reason :  namely,  that  he,  Cunningham,  had, 
without  any  previous  knowledge  of  these  airs,  invented 


ALLAN  CUNNINGHAM. 


655 


dl  or  most  of  them  propria  marte ;  so  that,  like  the 
archetypal  ideas  in  some  systems  of  philosophers,  one 
might  affirm,  upon  his  representation  of  things,  tha* 
Scottish  airs  were  eternally  present  to  the  ear  of  the 
Demiurgus,  and  eternally  producing  themselves  afresh. 
This  seemed  fanciful,  if  not  c::travagant ;  and  one  at 
least  of  Cunningham's  works  —  that  which  relates  to 
Robert  Bruce  —  is  also  extravagant  in  an  outrageous 
degree.  And,  by  the  way,  on  that  ground,  I  should  have 
guessed  him  to  be  a  man  of  genius,  were  there  even  no 
other  ground ;  for  no  man  but  a  man  of  genius,  and  with 
the  inequality  of  genius,  can,  in  one  state  of  mind,  writp 
beautifully,  and,  in  another,  write  the  merest  extrava 
gance  ;  nay,  (with  Cunningham's  cordial  assent,  I  pre- 
sume, that  I  may  say,)  awful  extravagance.  Meantime, 
in  practical  life,  Cunningham  was  anything  but  extrava- 
gant :  he  was,  (as  I  have  said,)  in  a  high  intellectua) 
sense,  and  in  the  merest  mechanical  sense,  the  right-hapd. 
man  of  Chantrey,  whom,  by  the  way,  he  always  spoke  of 
with  the  highest  and  evidently  the  sincerest  respect :  be 
was  his  right-hand  man,  also,  in  a  middle  sense,  or,  as  [ 
have  said,  a  mechanico-intellectual  way.  P'or  example, 
he  purchased  all  the  marble  for  Chantrey  ;  which  migbv 
require,  perhaps,  mixed  qualifications  ;  he  distributed  the 
daily  labors  of  the  workmen  ;  which  must  have  required 
such  as  were  purely  mechanic.  He  transacted,  also,  all 
the  negotiations  for  choosing  the  site  of  monuments  to 
be  erected  in  Westminster  Abbey  ;  a  commission  which 
might  frequently  demand  some  diplomatic  address  in  the 
.  onduct  of  the  negotiations  with  the  Abbey  authorities  ;  a 
"unction  of  his  duties  which  chiefly  regarded  the  interest 
of  his  principal.  Sir  Francis  Chantrey,  as  also  a  just  eye 
for  the  effect  of  a  monument,  combined  with  a  judic;iou8 
calculation  of  the  chances  it  had,  at  one  point  rather  tlian 


656 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES 


another,  for  catching  the  public  notice :  this  latter  func- 
ticn  of  his  complex  office,  regarding  mainly  the  interests 
of  the  defunct  persons  or  his  relations,  and  those  of  Chan* 
trey,  only  in  a  secondary  way. 

This  aspect  of  Cunningham's  official  or  ministerial  life 
reminds  me,  by  the  way,  of  the  worst  aspect  under  whicti 
his  nationality  or  civic  illiberality  revealed  itself;  an  illib- 
erality  which  here  took  the  shape  of  bigotry.  A  Scotch- 
man, or  Scotsman,  who  happens  to  hate  England,  is  sure 
d  fortiori,  to  hate  the  English  Church  ;  which,  on  account 
of  its  surplice,  its  organs,  its  cathedrals,  and  its  mitred 
prelates,  he  has  been  taught  to  consider  as  the  sister  of 
the  Babylonian  Rome.  Strange,  indeed,  that  the  Scottish 
Church  should  have  been  the  favorite  church  of  the  poor, 
which  began  so  undeniably  upon  the  incitement  of  the 
rich.  They,  the  rich  and  the  aristocratic,  had  revelled  in 
the  spoils  of  the  monastic  orders,  at  the  dissolution  of  the 
Romish  Church.  Naturally  unwilling  to  resign  their  booty, 
they  promoted  a  church  built  upon  a  principle  of  poverty 
and  humility  :  a  church  that  would  not  seek  to  resume 
her  plundered  property.  Under  their  political  intrigues 
it  was  that  all  the  contests  arose  in  the  seventeenth  cen- 
tury :  first,  by  slight  prelusive  efforts  during  the  long 
reign  of  James  the  Sixth  or  First ;  and,  secondly,  by  a 
determinate  civil  war  in  that  of  Charles  the  First  and 
Second.  But  in  this  last  case,  the  '  martyrs,'  as  they  are 
called  —  those  who  fought  at  Drumclog,  <fec.  —  waiving 
all  question  of  their  real  temper  and  religious  merits,  were, 
upon  one  single  ground,  incapable  of  founding  a  national 
church  :  they  were  too  few :  a  small  body  reckoned  by 
hundreds,  and  not  by  thousands,  never  could  pretend  to 
represent  the  million  of  souls,  or  upwards,  to  which,  even 
in  those  days  the  Scottish  nation  amounted.  What  1 
maintain,  therefore,  is,  that  no  matter  how  the  Presby- 


ALIiAN  CUNNINGHAM. 


657 


terian  Church  came  to  have  its  legal  establishment 
revived  and  ratified,  it  cannot  be  pretended  historically, 
chat  this  establishment  owed  much  to  the  struggles  in 
Charles  the  Second's  days,  by  which  (so  far  as  affected  at 
all)  it  was  injured.  This  church,  dated  from  older  times, 
went  back  to  those  times  for  sanction  and  for  arguments 
of  its  conformity  to  the  national  taste  ;  seeing  that,  in 
those  elder  times,  it  did  really  count  upon  the  great 
majority  of  the  nation  as  its  affectionate  and  zealous 
supporters  :  whereas,  in  the  Cameronian  days,  none  but 
the  very  slenderest  minority,  and  that  minority,  again, 
not  numbering  any  people  of  weight  or  consideration  fot 
either  property  or  intelligence  or  talent  —  no  party  of 
any  known  account  —  no  party  who  were  even  mominally 
known  to  the  people  of  Scotland  —  had  chosen,  at  any 
crisis  in  the  reign  of  the  second  Charles,  to  join  these 
religious  malecontents.  Much  more  might  be  said  with 
truth  ;  but  this  may  suffice  —  that  the  insurrectionary 
movements  in  Scotland,  during  that  reign,  were,  rela- 
tively to  the  state  and  to  the  public  peace  of  Scotland, 
pretty  much  the  same  as  the  rising  in  the  cotton  districts 

at  the  instigation  of  Edwards,  in  the  year  ,  to  the 

general  stability  of  the  British  government  at  that  era. 
The  Church  of  Scotland,  therefore,  does  not,  in  fact, 
connect  itself — for  any  part  of  the  impulse  to  which  it 
owes  its  birth,  however  in  words  or  false  pretences  it  may 
do  so  —  with  any  of  the  movements  whether  prosperous 
for  the  moment,  or  hopelessly  ruinous,  made  about  1677 
by  the  religious  Whigs  of  Scotland.  In  fact,  like  the 
insurgent  cotton  spinners,  these  turbulent  people  were 
chiefly  from  the  west.  '  The  Western '  people  they  were 
then  called,  and  the  *  Westlanders '  —  so  little  were  they 
dt  that  time  supposed  to  represent  Scotland.  Such  is  the 
truth  of  history.  Nevertheless,  in  our  insurrectionary 
42 


£58 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


days,  (insurrectionary  I  mean,  by  the  character  of  the 
pretensions  advanced  —  not  by  overt  acts,)  it  has  been  a 
delightful  doctrine  to  lay  the  foundations  of  the  Scottish 
Kirk  in  rebellion  ;  and  hence  the  false  importance  assigned 
to  the  Cameronian  insurgents.  And  hence  partly  it  has 
happened,  that  Scottish  nationality  and  hatred  of  England 
has  peculiarly  associated  itself  with  the  later  church  his- 
tory of  Scotland  ;  for,  as  to  the  earlier,  and  really  impor- 
tant era  of  Scottish  Church  struggles  with  the  civil  power, 
the  English  were  looked  to  as  their  brethren  and  effectual 
allies :  and  as  the  Scottish  Church  necessarily  recalls  to 
the  mind  the  anti-pole  of  the  English  Church,  thus  also 
it  has  happened,  that  all  symbols  or  exponents  of  the 
English  Episcopal  Church,  are,  to  a  low-born  Scottish 
patriot,  so  many  counter-symbols  of  his  own  national  or 
patriotic  prejudices. 

Thus,  or  in  some  such  way,  it  happened  that  Cunning- 
ham never  showed  his  illiberality  so  strongly  as  with 
reference  to  his  negotiations  with  Westminster  Abbey. 
The  '  rapacity '  and  '  avarice  *  of  the  Church  of  England 
is  the  open  theme  of  his  attacks  in  his  paper  upon  Lord 
Byron's  funeral ;  though,  perhaps,  he  would  find  it  hard 
to  substantiate  his  charge.  Notoriously  the  church, 
whether  as  Dean  and  Chapter,  or  as  Collegiate  Corpora- 
tions, or  as  Episcopal  Sees,  has  ever  been  found  the  most 
lenient  of  all  masters  under  which  to  hold  property  ;  and 
it  is  not  very  probable  that  the  church  would  suddenly 
"hange  its  character  under  a  treaty  with  a  popular  artist. 

However,  if  all  his  foibles  or  infirmities  had  been 
summed  up,  Allan  Cunningham  still  remained  a  man  to 
ddmire  and  love  :  and  by  comparison  with  those  of  his 
own  order,  men  raised,  that  is  to  say,  by  force  of  genius, 
from  the  lowest  rank,  (the  rank  in  Ids  case,  of  a  work- 
ing mason,  as  I  have  heard  him  declare,)  his  meritf 


ALLAN  CTTNNINGHAM. 


659 


became  best  appreciable.  The  faults  of  men  self-taught, 
(the  avroSidaxTot,)  and  men  self-raised,  are  almost  prover- 
bial. The  vanity  and  inflation  of  heart,  the  egotism  and 
nrrogance  of  such  men,  were  as  alien  from  the  character 
cf  Cunningham  as  of  any  man  I  ever  knew ;  and,  in 
other  respects,  he  was  no  less  advantageously  dis- 
tinguished from  his  order.  Hogg,  for  instance,  was 
absolutely  insufferable  in  conversation.  Egotism  the 
most  pertinacious  might  have  been  excused ;  but  thd 
matter  of  this  egotism  was  so  trivial  and  insane,  seldom 
relating  to  any  higher  subject  than  a  conflict  with  a 
•  sawmon,'  that  human  patience  could  not  weather  the 
infliction.  In  Cunningham  there  was  rarely  an  allusion 
to  himself.  Some  people,  it  is  true,  might  be  annoyed 
by  his  too  frequent  allusions  to  his  own  personal  strength 
and  size,  which  he  overrated ;  for  they  were  not  remarka- 
ble ;  or,  if  they  had  been,  what  does  one  man  care  about 
another  man's  qualities  of  person,  this  way  or  that,  unless 
in  so  far  as  he  may  sometimes  be  called  upon  to  describe 
them,  in  order  to  meet  the  curiosity  of  others.  But 
Cunningham's  allusions  of  this  kind,  though  troublesome 
at  times,  seemed  always  jocose,  and  did  not  argue  any 
shade  of  conceit.  In  more  serious  and  natural  subjects 
of  vanity,  he  seemed  to  be  as  little  troubled  with  any 
morbid  self-esteem.  And,  in  all  other  respects,  Cunnings 
ham  was  a  whole  world  above  his  own  order  of  self- 
raised  men  —  not  less  in  gravity,  sense,  and  manliness 
of  thought,  than  in  the  dignified  respectability  of  his 
conduct.  He  was  rising  an  inch  in  the  world  every  day 
of  his  life  ;  for  his  whole  day,  from  sunrise  to  bedtime, 
was  dedicated  to  active  duties  cheerfully  performed. 
And  on  this  subject,  one  anecdote  is  remarkable,  and 
deserves  a  lasting  record  among  the  memorials  of  literary 
men.    I  have  mentioned  and  described  his  station  and  its 


660 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


manifold  duties,  in  relation  to  Sir  Francis  Chantrey. 
Now,  he  has  told  me  himself  repeatedly,  and  certainly, 
from  my  own  observation  and  that  of  others,  I  have  no 
doubt  of  his  literal  veracity,  that,  in  the  course  of  his 
whole  connection  with  that  eminent  sculptor,  he  never 
borrowed  one  single  hour  from  his  ministerial  labors  on 
account  of  his  principal,  either  to  compose  or  to  correct 
one  of  those  many  excellent,  sometimes  brilliant,  pages, 
by  which  he  has  delighted  so  many  thousands  of  readers, 
ftnd  won  for  himself  a  lasting  name  in  the  fine  literature 
of  modern  England. 


LIBELLOUS  ATTACK  BY  A  LONDON^  JOURNAL.  661 


CHAPTER  XXIII. 


LIBELLOUS  ATTACK  BY  A  LONDON  JOURNAL. 


This  mention  of  Allan  Cunningham  recalls  to  my 
recollection  an  affair  which  retains  one  part  of  its  interest 
to  this  day,  arising  out  of  the  very  important  casuistical 
question  which  it  involves.  We  Protestant  nations  are  in 
the  habit  of  treating  casuistry  as  a  field  of  speculation, 
false  and  baseless  per  se ;  nay,  we  regard  it  not  so  much 
in  the  light  of  a  visionary  and  idle  speculation,  as  one 
positively  erroneous  in  its  principles,  and  mischievous  for 
its  practical  results.  This  is  due  in  part  to  the  dispropor- 
tionate importance  which  the  Church  of  Rome  has  always 
attached  to  casuistry  ;  making,  in  fact,  this  supplementary 
section  of  ethics  take  precedency  of  its  elementary  doc- 
trines in  their  Catholic  simplicity :  as  though  the  plain  and 
broad  highway  of  morality  were  scarcely  ever  the  safe 
road,  but  that  every  case  of  human  conduct  were  to  be 
treated  as  an  exception,  and  never  as  lying  within  the 
universal  rule :  and  thus  forcing  the  simple,  honest- 
minded  Christian  to  travel  upon  a  tortuous  by-road,  in 
which  he  could  not  advance  a  step  in  security  without 
a  spiritual  guide  at  his  elbow  ;  and,  in  fact,  whenever  the 
hair-splitting  casuistry  is  brought,  with  all  its  elaborate 
machinery,  to  bear  upon  the  s'mplicities  of  household 
life,  and  upon  the  daily  intercourse  of  the  world,  there  it 
^  the  effect  (and  is  expressly  cherished  by  the  Romish 


662 


LITERARY  REMxx'fX's,OENGES. 


Church  with  a  view  to  the  effect)  of  raising  the  spiritual 
pastor  into  a  sort  of  importance  which  corresponds  to  that 
of  an  attorney.  The  consulting  casuist  is,  in  fact,  to  all 
intents  and  purposes,  a  moral  attorney.  For,  as  the  plain- 
est man,  with  the  most  direct  purposes,  is  yet  reasonably 
afraid  to  trust  himself  to  his  own  guidance  in  any  affair 
connected  with  questions  of  law  ;  so  also,  when  taught  to 
believe  that  an  upright  intention  and  good  sense  are 
equally  insufficient  in  morals,  as  they  are  in  law,  to  keep 
him  from  stumbling  or  from  missing  his  road,  he  comes  to 
regard  a  conscience-keeper  as  being  no  less  indispensable 
for  his  daily  life  and  conversation  than  his  legal  agent,  or 
his  professional  '  man  of  business,'  for  the  safe  manage- 
ment of  his  property,  and  for  his  guidance  amongst  the 
innumerable  niceties  which  beset  the  real  and  inevitable 
intricacies  of  rights  and  duties,  as  they  grow  out  of  human 
enactments  and  a  complex  condition  of  society. 

Fortunately  for  the  happiness  of  human  nature  and  its 
dignity,  those  holier  rights  and  duties  which  grow  out  of 
laws  heavenly  and  divine,  written  by  the  finger  of  God 
(I  upon  the  heart  of  every  l^ational  creature,  are  beset  by  no 
such  intricacies,  and  require,  therefore,  no  such  vicarious 
agency  for  their  practical  assertion.  The  primal  duties 
of  life,  like  the  primal  charities,  are  placed  high  above  us 
—  legible  to  every  eye,  and  shining  like  the  stars,  with  a 
splendor  that  is  read  in  every  clime,  and  translates  itself 
into  every  language  at  once.  Such  is  the  imagery  of 
Wordsworth.  But  this  is  otherwise  estimated  in  the  policy 
of  papal  Rome  ;  and  casuistry  usurps  a  place  in  her 
spiritual  economy,  to  which  our  Protestant  feelings  demur. 
So  far,  however,  the  question  between  us  and  Rome  is  a 
question  of  degress.  They  push  casuistry  into  a  general 
and  unlimited  application  ;  we,  if  at  all,  into  a  very 
Tiarrow  one.    But  another  difference  there  is  between  ua 


LIBELLOUS  ATTACK  BY  A  LONDON  JOURNAL.  663 

even  more  important ;  for  it  regards  no  mere  excess  in 
the  quantity  of  range  allowed  to  casuistry,  but  in  the 
quality  of  its  speculations ;  and  which  it  is  (more  than  any 
other  cause)  that  has  degraded  the  office  of  casuistical 
learning  amongst  us.  Questions  are  raised,  problems  are 
entertained,  by  the  Romish  casuistry,  which  too  often 
offend  against  all  purity  and  manliness  of  thinking.  And 
that  objection  occurs  forcibly  here,  which  Southey  (either 
in  The  Quarterly  Review  or  in  his  '  Life  of  Wesley ')  has 
urged  and  expanded  with  regard  to  the  Romish  and  also 
the  Methodist  practice  of  auricular  confession,  viz.  — 
that,  as  it  is  practically  managed,  not  leaving  the  person 
engaged  in  this  act  to  confess  according  to  the  light  of  his 
own  conscience,  but  at  every  moment  interfering,  on  the 
part  of  the  confessor,  to  suggest  leading  questions  (as  law- 
yers call  them),  and  to  throw  the  light  of  confession  upon 
parts  of  the  experience  which  native  modesty  would  leave 
in  darkness,  —  so  managed,  the  practice  of  confession  is 
undoubtedly  the  most  demoralizing  practice  known  to  any 
Christian  society.  Innocent  young  persons,  whose  thoughts 
would  never  have  wandered  out  upon  any  impure  images 
or  suggestions,  have  their  ingenuity  and  their  curiosity 
sent  roving  upon  unlawful  quests  ;  they  are  instructed  to 
watch  what  else  would  pass  undetained  in  the  mind, 
and  would  pass  unblamably,  on  the  Miltonic  principle  : 
('  Evil  into  the  mind  of  God  or  man  may  come  unblamed/ 
&c.)  Nay,  which  is  worst  of  all,  unconscious  or  semi- 
conscious thoughts  and  feelings  or  natural  impulses, 
rising,  like  a  breath  of  wind  under  some  motion  of  nature, 
and  again  dying  away,  because  not  made  the  subject  of 
artificial  review  and  interpretation,  are  now  brought  pow- 
erfully under  the  focal  light  of  the  consciousness  ;  and 
vhatsoever  is  once  made  the  subject  of  consciousness, 
lan  never  again  have   the   privilege   of  gay,  careless 


664 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


thoughtlessness  —  the  privilege  hy  which  the  mind,  like 
the  lamps  of  a  mail-coach,  moving  rapidly  through  the 
midnight  woods,  illuminate,  for  one  instant,  the  foliage  or 
sleoping  umbrage  of  the  thickets  ;  and,  in  the  next  in- 
stant, have  quitted  them,  to  carry  their  radiance  forward 
upon  endless  successions  of  objects.  This  happy  privi- 
lege is  forfeited  for  ever,  when  the  pointed  significancy 
of  the  confessor's  questions,  and  the  direct  knowledge 
which  he  plants  in  the  mind,  have  awakened  a  guilty 
familiarity  with  every  form  of  impurity  and  unhallowed 
sensuality. 

Here,  then,  are  objections  sound  and  deep,  to  casuistry, 
as  managed  in  the  Romish  Church.  Every  possible  ob- 
jection ever  made  to  auricular  confession  applies  with 
equal  strength  to  casuistry  ;  and  some  objections,  besides 
these,  are  peculiar  to  itself.  And  yet,  after  all,  these  are 
but  objections  to  casuistry  as  treated  by  a  particular 
Church.  Casuistry  in  itself  —  casuistry  as  a  possible,  as  a 
most  useful,  and  a  most  interesting  speculation  —  remains 
unaffected  by  any  one  of  these  objections  ;  for  none  ap- 
plies to  the  essence  of  the  case,  but  only  to  its  accidents,  or 
separable  adjuncts.  Neither  is  this  any  curious  or  subtle 
observation  of  little  practical  value.  The  fact  is  as  far 
otherwise  as  can  be  imagined  —  the  defect  to  which 
I  am  here  pointing,  is  one  of  the  most  clamorous  import- 
ance. 

Of  what  value,  let  me  ask,  is  Paley's  Moral  Philosophy  ? 
What  is  its  imagined  use  ?  Is  it  that  in  substance  it  re- 
veals any  new  duties,  or  banishes  as  false  any  old  ones  ? 
No  ;  but  because  the  known  and  admitted  duties  —  duties 
recognized  in  every  system  of  ethics  —  are  here  placed 
(successfully  or  not)  upon  new  foundations,  or  brought 
into  relation  with  new  principles  not  previously  perceived 
10  be  in  any  relation  whatever.    This,  in  fact,  is  the  very 


LIBELLOUS  ATTACK  BY  A  LONDON  J0X7RNAL.  6G5 


meaning  of  a  theory*  or  contemplation,  [©^tu^ia,]  Avhen 
A,  B,  C,  old  and  undisputed  facts,  have  their  relations  to 
each  other  developed.  It  is  not,  therefore,  for  any  prac- 
tical benefit  in  action,  so  much  as  for  the  satisfaction  of 
the  understanding,  when  reflecting  on  a  man's  own  actions, 
the  wish  to  see  what  his  conscience  or  his  heart  prompts 
reconciled  to  general  laws  of  thinking  —  this  is  the  par- 
ticular service  performed  by  Paley's  Moral  Philosophy.  It 
does  not  so  much  profess  to  tell  what  you  are  to  do,  as  the 
why  and  the  wherefore  ;  and,  in  particular,  to  show  how 
one  rule  of  action  may  be  reconciled  to  some  other  rule 
of  equal  authority,  but  which,  apparently,  is  in  hostility 
to  the  first.  Such,  then,  is  the  utmost  and  highest  aim  of 
the  Paleyian  or  the  Ciceronian  ethics,  as  they  exist. 
Meantime,  the  grievous  defect  to  which  I  have  adverted 
above  —  a  defect  equally  found  in  all  systems  of  morality, 
from  the  Nichomachean  ethics  of  Aristotle  downwards  — 

*  No  terms  of  art  are  used  so  arbitrarily,  and  with  snch  perfect 
levity,  as  the  terms  hypothesisy  theory ^  system.  Most  writers  use  one 
or  other  with  the  same  indifference  that  they  use  in  constructing  the 
title  of  a  novel,  or,  suppose,  of  a  pamphlet,  where  the  phrase  thoughts, 
or  strictures y  or  considerations y  upon  so  and  so,  are  used  ad  libitum. 
Meantime,  the  distinctions  are  essential.  That  is  properly  an  hypo- 
thesis where  the  question  is  about  a  cause  :  certain  phenomena  are 
known  and  given :  the  object  is  to  place  below  these  phenomena  a 
basis  [vTtodtatg']  capable  of  supporting  them,  and  accounting  for 
them.  Thus,  if  you  were  to  assign  a  cause  suflBcient  to  account  for 
the  aurora  borealisy  that  would  be  an  hypothesis.  But  a  theory,  on 
the  other  hand,  takes  a  multitude  of  facts  all  disjointed,  or,  at  most, 
Buspected,  of  some  interdependency  :  these  it  takes  and  places  under 
strict  laws  of  relation  to  each  other.  But  here  there  is  no  question 
of  a  cause.  Finally,  a  system  is  the  synthesis  of  a  theory  and  an 
hypothesis  :  it  states  the  relations  as  amongst  an  undigested  mass, 
rudi^  indigcstaque  moleSy  of  known  phenomena;  and  it  assigns  a 
basis  for  the  whole,  as  in  an  hypothesis.  These  distinctions  would 
teooine  vivid  and  convincing  by  the  help  of  proper  illustrationa. 


666 


LITERARY  REMINISCE  N^CES. 


is  the  want  of  a  casuistry,  by  way  of  supplement  to  the 
main  system,  and,  governed  by  the  spirit  of  the  very  same 
laws,  which  the  writer  has  previous  employed  in  the 
main  body  of  his  work.  And  the  immense  superiority  of 
this  supplementary  section,  to  the  main  body  of  the  sys- 
tems, would  appear  in  this,  that  the  latter,  I  have  just  been 
saying,  aspires  only  to  guide  the  reflecting  judgment  in 
harmonizing  the  different  parts  of  his  own  conduct,  so  aa 
to  bring  them  under  the  same  law  ;  whereas  the  casuisti- 
cal section,  in  the  supplement,  would  seriously  undertake 
to  guide  the  conduct,  in  many  doubtful  cases,  of  action  — 
cases  which  are  so  regarded  by  all  thinking  persons. 
Take,  for  example,  the  case  which  so  often  arises  between 
master  and  servant,  and  in  so  many  varieties  of  form  —  a 
case  which  requires  you  to  decide  between  some  violation 
of  your  conscience,  on  the  one  hand,  as  to  veracity,  by 
saying  something  that  is  not  strictly  true,  as  well  as  by 
evading  (and  that  is  often  done)  all  answer  to  inquiries 
which  you  are  unable  to  meet  satisfactorily  —  a  violation 
of  your  conscience  to  this  extent,  and  in  this  way  ;  or,  on 
the  other  hand,  a  still  more  painful  violation  of  your 
conscience  in  consigning  deliberately  some  young  woman 
—  faulty,  no  doubt,  and  erring,  but  yet  likely  to  derive  a 
lesson  from  her  own  errors,  and  the  risk  to  which  they 
have  exposed  her  —  consigning  her,  I  say,  to  ruin,  by 
refusing  her  a  character,  and  thus  shutting  the  door  upon 
all  the  paths  by  which  she  might  retrace  her  steps.  This 
I  state  as  one  amongst  the  many  cases  of  conscience 
daily  occurring  in  the  common  business  of  the  world.  It 
would  surprise  any  reader  to  find  how  many  they  are  ; 
in  fact,  a  very  large  volume  might  be  easily  collected  of 
Buch  cases  as  are  of  ordinary  occurrence.  Casuistry'^ 
the  very  word  casuistry  expresses  the  science  whicL 
deals  with  such  cases  ;  for  as  a  case,  in  the  declension  o* 


LIBELLOUS  ATTACK  BT  A  LONDON  JOUKNAL.  667 

ft  noun,  means  a  falling  away,  or  a  deflection  from  the 
upright  nominative,  (rectus,)  so  a  case  in  ethics  implies 
some  falling  off,  or  deflection  from  the  high  road  of 
catholic  morality.  Now,  of  all  such  cases,  one,  perhaps 
the  most  difficult  to  manage,  the  most  intractable,  whether 
for  consistency  of  thinking  as  to  the  theory  of  morals,  or 
for  consistency  of  action  as  to  the  practice  of  morals,  is 
the  cass  of  duelling. 

As  an  introduction,  I  will  state  my  story  —  the  case  for 
the  casuist ;  and  then  say  one  word  on  the  reason  of  the 
case. 

First,  let  me  report  the  case  of  a  friend  —  a  distin- 
guished lawyer  at  the  English  bar.  I  had  the  circum- 
stances from  himself,  which  lie  in  a  very  small  compass ; 
and,  as  my  friend  is  known,  to  a  proverb  almost,  for  his 
literal  accuracy  in  all  statements  of  fact,  there  need  be  no 
fear  of  any  mistake  as  to  the  main  points  of  the  case. 
He  was  one  day  engaged  in  pleading  before  the  Commis- 
sioners of  Bankruptcy  ;  a  court  then  newly  appointed, 
and  differently  constituted,  I  believe,  in  some  respects, 
from  its  present  form.  That  particular  commissioner,  as 
it  happened,  who  presided  at  that  moment  when  the  case 
occurred,  had  been  recently  appointed,  and  did  not  know 
the  faces  of  those  who  chiefly  practised  in  the  court.  All 
things,  indeed,  concurred  to  favor  his  mistake  :  for  the 
case  itself  came  on  in  a  shape  or  in  a  stage  which  was 
liable  to  misinterpretation,  from  the  partial  view  which  it 
allowed  of  the  facts,  under  the  hurry  of  the  procedure  : 
and  my  friend,  also,  unluckily,  had  neglected  to  assume 
his  barrister  s  costume,  so  that  he  passed,  in  the  commis 
Bioner's  appreciation,  as  an  attorney.  '  What  if  he  had 
\)een  an  attorney  ?  '  it  may  be  said  :  '  was  he,  therefore, 
^pfls  entitled  to  courtesy  or  justice  ?  '  Certainly  not ;  nor 
is  it  my  business  to  apologize  for  the  commissioner  But 


S68 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES* 


it  may  easily  be  imagined,  and  making  allowances  for 
the  confusion  of  hurry  and  imperfect  knowledge  of  the 
case)  it  does  offer  something  in  palliation  of  the  judge's 
rashness,  that,  amongst  a  large  heap  of  '  Old  Bailey ' 
attorneys  who  notoriously  attended  this  court  for  the 
express  purpose  of  whitewashing  their  clients,  and  who 
were  in  bad  odor  as  tricksters,  he  could  hardly  have  been 
expected  to  make  a  special  exception  in  favor  of  one 
particular  man,  who  had  not  protected  himself  by  the 
insignia  of  his  order.  His  main  error,  however,  lay  in 
misapprehending  the  case :  this  misapprehension  lent 
strength  to  the  assumption  that  my  friend  was  an  *  Old 
Bailey '  (t.  e,  a  sharking)  attorney ;  whilst,  on  the  other 
hand,  that  assumption  lent  strength  to  his  misapprehension 
of  the  case.  Angry  interruptions  began :  these,  being 
retorted  or  resented  with  just  indignation,  produced  an 
irritation  and  ill-temper,  which,  of  themselves,  were 
quite  sufficient  to  raise  a  cloud  of  perplexity  over  any 
law  process,  and  to  obscure  it  for  any  understanding. 
The  commissioner  grew  warmer  and  warmer ;  and,  at 
length,  he  had  the  presumption  to  say  —  *  Sir,  you  are  a 
disgrace  to  your  profession.'  When  such  sugar-plums, 
as  Captain  M'Turk  the  peacemaker  observes,  were  flying 
between  them,  there  could  be  no  room  for  further  parley. 
That  same  night  the  commissioner  was  waited  on  by  a 
friend  of  the  barrister's,  who  cleared  up  his  own  miscon- 
ceptions to  the  disconcerted  judge ;  placed  him,  even  to 
his  own  judgment,  thoroughly  in  the  wrong;  and  then 
most  courteously  troubled  him  for  a  reference  to  some 
gentleman,  who  would  arrange  the  terms  of  a  meeting 
for  the  next  day.  The  commissioner  was  too  just  and 
grave  a  man  to  be  satisfied  with  himself,  on  a  cool  review 
of  his  own  conduct.  Here  was  a  quarrel  ripened  into  a 
mortal  feud,  likely  enough  to  terminate  in  wounds,  or. 


LIBELLOUS  ATTACK  BY  A  LONDON  JOURNAL.  669 

possibly,  in  death  to  one  of  the  parties,  which,  on  hia 
side,  carried  with  it  no  palliations  from  any  provocation 
received,  or  from  wrong  and  insult,  in  any  form,  sustained  : 
these,  in  an  aggravated  shape,  could  be  pleaded  by  my 
friend,  but  with  no  opening  for  retaliatory  pleas  on  the 
part  of  the  magistrate.  That  name,  again,  of  magistrate, 
increased  his  offence  and  pointed  its  moral  :  he,  a  con- 
servator of  the  laws  —  he,  a  dispenser  of  equity,  sitting 
even  at  the  very  moment  on  the  judgment  seat  —  he  to 
have  commenced  a  brawl,  nay,  to  have  fastened  a  quarrel 
upon  a  man  even  then  of  some  consideration  and  of  high 
promise  ;  a  quarrel  which  finally  tended  to  this  result  — 
shoot  or  be  shot.  That  commissioner's  situation  and  state 
of  mind,  for  the  succeeding  night,  were  certainly  not  en- 
viable :  like  Southey's  erring  painter,  who  had  yielded  to 
the  temptation  of  the  subtle  fiend, 

*  With  repentance  his  only  companion  he  lay  ; 
And  a  dismal  companion  is  she,' 

Meantime,  my  friend  —  what  was  his  condition  ;  and 
how  did  he  pass  the  interval  ?  I  have  heard  him  feelingly 
describe  the  misery,  the  blank  anguish  of  this  memorable 
night.  Sometimes  it  happens  that  a  man's  conscience  is 
wounded  :  but  this  very  wound  is  the  means,  perhaps,  by 
which  his  feelings  are  spared  for  the  present :  sometimes 
his  feelings  are  lacerated  ;  but  this  very  laceration  makes 
the  ransom  for  his  conscience.  Here,  on  the  contrary,  his 
feelings  and  his  happiness  were  dimmed  by  the  very  same 
cause  which  offered  pain  and  outrage  to  his  conscience. 
He  was,  upon  principle,  a  hater  of  duelling.  Under  any 
circumstances,  he  would  have  condemned  the  man  who 
could,  for  a  light  cause,  or  almost  for  the  weightiest,  have 
«o  much  as  accepted  a  challenge.  Yet,  here  he  was  posi- 
tively offej'ing  a  challenge  ;  and  to  whom  ?  To  a  man 
whom  he  scarcely  knew  by  sight ;  whom  he  had  neve? 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


spoken  to  until  this  unfortunate  afternoon ;  and  tuwardi 
whom  (now  that  the  momentary  excitement  of  anger  had 
passed  away)  he  felt  no  atom  of  passion  or  resentment 
whatsoever.  As  a  free  '  unhoused '  young  man,  therefore, 
had  he  been  such,  without  ties  or  obligations  in  life,  he 
would  have  felt  the  profoundest  compunction  at  the  antici- 
pation of  any  serious  injury  inflicted  upon  another  man's 
hopes  or  happiness,  or  upon  his  own.  But  what  was  his 
real  situation  ?  He  was  a  married  man,  married  to  the 
woman  of  his  choice  within  a  very  few  years :  he  was 
also  a  father,  having  one  most  promising  son,  somewhere, 
about  three  years  old.  His  young  wife  and  his  son  com- 
posed his  family  ;  and  both  were  dependent,  in  the  most 
absolute  sense,  for  all  they  possessed  or  they  expected  — 
for  all  they  had  or  ever  could  have  —  upon  his  own  exer- 
tions. Abandoned  by  him,  losing  him,  they  forfeited,  in 
one  hour,  every  chance  of  comfort,  respectability,  or  se- 
curity from  scorn  and  humiliation.  The  mother,  a  woman 
of  strong  understanding  and  most  excellent  judgment  — 
good  and  upright  herself  —  liable,  therefore,  to  no  habit 
of  suspicion,  and  constitutionally  cheerful,  went  to  bed 
with  her  young  son,  thinking  no  evil.  Midnight  came, 
one,  two  o'clock  ;  mother  and  child  had  long  been  asleep ; 
nor  did  either  of  them  dream  of  that  danger  which  even 
now  was  yawning  under  their  feet.  The  barrister  had 
spent  the  hours  from  ten  to  two  in  drawing  up  his  will, 
and  in  writing  such  letters  as  might  have  the  best  chance, 
in  case  of  fatal  issue  to  himself,  for  obtaining  some  aid  to 
the  desolate  condition  of  those  two  beings  whom  he  would 
leave  behind  unprotected  and  without  provision.  Often- 
times he  stole  into  the  bedroom,  and  gazed  with  anguish 
upon  the  innocent  objects  of  his  love;  and,  as  his  con- 
science now  told  him,  of  his  bitterest  perfidy.  '  Will  you 
then  leave  us?    Are  you  really  going  to  betray  us 


LIBELLOUS  ATTACK  BY  A  LONDON  JOURNAL.  671 

Will  you  deliberately  consign  us  to  life-long  poverty, 
and  scorn,  and  grief? '  These  affecting  apostrophes  he 
seemed,  in  the  silence  of  the  night,  to  hear  almost  with 
bodily  ears.  Silent  reproaches  seemed  written  upon  their 
sleeping  features ;  and  once,  when  his  wife  suddenly 
awakened  under  the  glare  of  the  lamp  which  he  carried, 
he  felt  the  strongest  impulse  to  fly  from  the  room ;  but  he 
faltered,  and  stood  rooted  to  the  spot.  She  looked  at  him 
smilingly,  and  asked  why  he  was  so  long  in  coming  to 
bed.  He  pleaded  an  excuse,  which  she  easily  admitted, 
of  some  law  case  to  study  against  the  morning,  or  some 
law  paper  to  draw.  She  was  satisfied  ;  and  fell  asleep 
again.  He,  however,  fearing,  above  all  things,  that  he 
might  miss  the  time  for  his  appointment,  resolutely  abided 
by  his  plan  of  not  going  to  bed ;  for  the  meeting  was  to 
take  place  at  Chalk  Farm,  and  by  half-past  five  in  the 
morning  :  that  is,  about  one  hour  after  sunrise.  One  hour 
and  a  half  before  this  time,  in  the  gray  dawn,  just  when 
the  silence  of  Nature  and  of  mighty  London  was  most 
absolute,  he  crept  stealthily,  and  like  a  guilty  thing,  to  the 
bedside  of  his  sleeping  wife  and  child;  took,  what  he 
believed  might  be  his  final  look  of  them ;  kissed  thenx 
softly  ;  and,  according  to  his  own  quotation  from  Coler* 
idge's  '  Remorse,* 

*  In  agony  that  could  not  be  remembered,' 

and  a  conflict  with  himself  that  defied  all  rehearsal,  he 
quitted  his  peaceful  cottage  at  Chelsea  in  order  to  seek  for 
the  friend  who  had  undertaken  to  act  as  his  second.  He 
had  good  reason,  from  what  he  had  heard  on  the  night 
before,  to  believe  his  antagonist  an  excellent  shot ;  and, 
having  no  sort  of  expectation  that  any  interruption  could 
oflTer  to  the  regular  progress  of  the  duel,  he,  as  the  chal- 
lenger, would  have  to  stand  the  first  fire ;  at  any  rate,  con- 


672 


LITERA.KY  REMINISCENCES. 


ceiving  this  to  be  the  fair  privilege  of  the  party  chaUenged, 
he  did  not  mean  to  avail  himself  of  any  proposal  for  draw- 
ing lots  upon  the  occasion,  even  if  such  a  proposal  should 
happen  to  be  made.  Thus  far  the  affair  had  travelled 
through  the  regular  stages  of  expectation  and  suspense ; 
but  the  interest  of  the  case,  as  a  story,  was  marred  and 
brought  to  an  abrupt  conclusion  by  the  conduct  of  the 
commissioner.  He  was  a  man  of  known  courage,  but  he 
also  was  a  man  of  conscientious  scruples ;  and,  amongst 
other  instances  of  courage,  had  the  courage  to  own  him- 
self in  the  wrong.  He  felt  that  his  conduct  hitherto  had 
not  been  wise  or  temperate,  and  that  he  would  be  sadly 
aggravating  his  original  error,  by  persisting  in  aiming  at  a 
man's  life,  upon  which  life  hung  also  the  happiness  of 
others,  merely  because  he  had  offered  to  that  man  a  most 
unwarranted  insult.  Feeling  this,  he  thought  fit,  at  first 
coming  upon  the  ground,  to  declare  that,  having  learned, 
since  the  scene  in  court,  the  real  character  of  his  antago- 
nist, and  the  extent  of  his  own  mistake,  he  was  resolved 
to  brave  all  appearances  and  ill-natured  judgments,  by 
making  an  ample  apology ;  which,  accordingly,  he  did ; 
and  so  the  affair  terminated.  I  have  thought  it  right, 
however,  to  report  the  circumstances,  both  because  they 
were  really  true  in  every  particular,  but,  much  more,  be- 
cause they  place  in  strong  relief  one  feature  which  is 
often  found  in  these  cases,  and  which  is  allowed  far  too 
little  weight  in  distributing  the  blame  between  the 
parties ;  to  this  I  wish  to  solicit  the  reader's  attention. 
During  the  hours  of  this  never-to-be-forgotten  night  of 
wretchedness  and  anxiety,  my  friend's  reflection  was  nat- 
urally forced  upon  the  causes  which  had  produced  it.  In 
the  world's  judgment,  he  was  aware  that  he  himself,  as 
the  one  charged  with  the  most  weighty  responsibility 
^those  who  depend  upon  him  being  the  most  entirely  help* 


LIBELLOUS  ATTACK  BY  A  LONDON  JOURNAL.  673 

less,)  would  have  to  sustain  by  much  the  heaviest  censure : 
and  yet  what  was  the  real  proportion  of  blame  between 
the  parties  ?  He,  when  provoked  and  publicly  insulted, 
had  retorted  angrily  :  that  was  almost  irresistible  under 
the  constitution  of  human  feelings ;  the  meekest  of  men 
could  scarcely  do  less.  But  surely  the  true  onus  of  wrong 
and  moral  responsibility  for  all  which  might  follow,  rested 
upon  that  party  who,  giving  way  to  mixed  impulses  of 
rash  judgment,  and  of  morose  temper,  had  allowed  him- 
self to  make  a  most  unprovoked  assault  upon  the  charac- 
ter of  one  whom  he  did  not  know ;  well  aware  that  such 
words,  uttered  publicly  by  a  person  in  authority,  must,  by 
some  course  or  other,  be  washed  out  and  cancelled ;  or, 
if  not,  that  the  party  submitting  to  such  defamatory  in- 
suits,  would  at  once  exile  himself  from  the  society  and 
countenance  of  his  professional  brethren.  Now,  then,  in 
all  justice,  it  should  be  so  ordered,  that  the  weight  of  pub- 
lic indignation  might  descsnd  upon  him,  whoever  he  might 
be,  (and,  of  course,  the  more  heavily,  according  to  the 
authority  of  his  station,  and  his  power  of  inflicting  wrong,) 
who  should  thus  wantonly  abuse  his  means  of  influence, 
to  the  dishonor  or  injury  of  an  unoffending  party.  We 
clothe  a  public  officer  with  power,  we  arm  him  with  in- 
fluential authority  over  public  opinion ;  not  that  he  may 
apply  these  authentic  sanctions  to  the  backing  of  his  own 
malice,  and  giving  weight  to  his  private  caprices :  and, 
wherever  such  abuse  takes  place,  then  it  should  be  so 
contrived  that  some  reaction  in  behalf  of  the  injured  per- 
son might  receive  a  sanction  equally  public.  And,  upon 
this  point,  I  shall  say  a  word  or  two  more,  after  first 
stating  my  own  case ;  a  case  where  the  outrage  was  far 
more  insuff*erable,  more  deliberate,  and  more  malicious  ; 
but,  on  the  other  hand,  in  this  respect  less  effectual  for 
injury,  that  it  carried  with  it  no  sanction  from  any  official 
43 


674 


LITEBAKY  REMINISCENCES. 


BtatioD  or  repute  in  the  unknown  parties  who  offered  the 
wrong. 

The  circumstances  were  these:  —  In  1824,  I  had  come 
up  to  London  upon  an  errand,  in  itself  sufficiently  vexa- 
tious —  of  fighting  against  pecuniary  embarrassments,  by 
literary  labors;  but,  as  had  always  happened  hitherto, 
with  very  imperfect  success,  from  the  miserable  thwart- 
ings  I  incurred  through  the  deranged  state  of  the  liver. 
My  zeal  was  great,  and  my  application  was  unintermit- 
ting ;  but  spirits  radically  vitiated,  chiefly  through  the 
direct  mechanical  depression  caused  by  one  important 
organ  deranged ;  and,  secondly,  by  a  reflex  effect  of  de- 
pression through  my  own  thoughts,  in  estimating  my 
prospects ;  together  with  the  aggravation  of  my  case,  by 
the  inevitable  exile  from  my  own  mountain  home,  —  all 
this  reduced  the  value  of  my  exertions  in  a  deplorable 
way.  It  was  rare,  indeed,  that  I  could  satisfy  my  own 
judgment,  even  tolerably,  with  the  quality  of  any  literary 
article  I  produced;  and  my  power  to  make  sustained 
exertions,  drooped,  in  a  way  I  could  not  control,  every 
other  hour  of  the  day  :  insomuch,  that  what  with  parts  to  be 
cancelled,  and  what  with  whole  days  of  torpor  and  pure 
defect  of  power  to  produce  any  thing  at  all,  very  often  it 
turned  out  that  all  my  labors  were  barely  sufficient  (some- 
times not  sufficient)  to  meet  the  current  expenses  of  my 
residence  in  London.  Three  months'  literary  toil  termi- 
nated, at  times,  in  a  result  =  0 ;  the  whole  plus  being  just 
equal  to  the  minus,  created  by  two  separate  establish- 
ments, and  one  of  them  in  the  most  extensive  city  of  the 
world.  Gloomy,  indeed,  was  my  state  of  mind  at  that 
period :  for  though  I  made  prodigious  efforts  to  recover 
my  health,  (sensible  that  all  other  efforts  depended  for 
their  result  upon  this  elementary  effort,  which  was  tlie 
conditio  sine  qua  non  for  the  rest,)  yet  all  availed  me  not. 


LIBELLOUS  ATTACK  BY  A  LONDON  JOURNAL.  675 

imd  a  curse  seemed  to  settle  upon  whatever  I  then  under- 
took. Such  was  my  frame  of  mind  on  reaching  London : 
in  fact  it  never  varied.  One  canopy  of  murky  clouds  (a 
copy  of  that  dun  atmosphere  which  settles  so  often  upon 
London)  brooded  for  ever  upon  my  spirits,  which  were  in 
one  uniformly  low  key  of  cheerless  despondency  ;  and,  on 
this  particular  morning,  my  depression  had  been  deeper 
than  usual,  from  the  effects  of  a  long  continuous  journey 
of  three  hundred  miles,  and  of  exhaustion  from  want  of 
sleep.  I  had  reached  London,  about  six  o'clock  in  the 
morning,  by  one  of  the  northern  mails ;  and,  resigning 
myself  as  usual,  in  such  cases,  to  the  chance  destination  of 
the  coach,  after  delivering  our  bags  in  Lombard  street,  I 
was  driven  down  to  a  great  city  hotel.  Here  there  were 
hot  baths  ;  and,  somewhat  restored  by  this  luxurious  re- 
freshment, about  eight  o'clock  I  was  seated  at  a  breakfast 
table  ;  upon  which,  in  a  few  minutes,  as  an  appendage 
not  less  essential  than  the  tea-service,  one  of  the  waiters 
laid  that  morning's  Times,  just  reeking  from  the  press. 
The  Times,  by  the  way,  is  notoriously  the  leading  journal 
of  Europe  anywhere ;  but,  in  London,  and  more  pe- 
culiarly in  the  city  quarter  of  London,  it  enjoys  a  pre- 
eminence scarcely  understood  elsewhere.  Here  it  is  not 
a  morning  paper,  but  the  morning  paper :  no  other  is 
known,  no  other  is  cited  as  authority  in  matters  of  fact. 
Strolling  with  my  eye  indolently  over  the  vast  Babylonian 
iOnfusion  of  the  enormous  columns,  naturally  as  one  of 
ihe  corps  litteraire,  I  found  my  attention  drawn  to  those 
regions  of  the  paper  which  announced  forthcoming  publi- 
cations. Amongst  them  was  a  notice  of  a  satirical  jour- 
nal, very  low  priced,  and  already  advanced  to  its  third  or 
fourth  number.  My  heart  palpitated  a  little  on  seeing 
myself  announced  as  the  principal  theme  for  the  malice 
of  the  current  number.    The  reader  must  not  suppose 


B76 


LITEKAKY  KEMINISCENCES. 


that  1  was  left  in  any  doubt  as  to  the  quality  of  the  notice 
with  which  I  had  been  honored ;  and  that,  by  possibility, 
I  waa  solacing  my  vanity  with  some  anticipation  of  honeyed 
compliments.  That,  1  can  assure  him,  was  made  altogeth- 
er impossible  by  the  kind  of  language  which  flourished  in 
the  very  foreground  of  the  programme,  and  even  of  the 
running  title.  The  exposure  and  depluming  (to  borrow  a 
good  word  from  the  fine  old  rhetorician,  Fuller)  of  the 
leading  '  humbugs  '  of  the  age  —  that  was  announced  as 
the  regular  business  of  the  journal :  and  the  only  question 
which  remained  to  be  settled  was,  the  more  or  less  of  the 
degree ;  and  also  one  other  question  even  more  interest- 
ing still,  viz.  —  whether  personal  abuse  were  intermingled 
with  literary.  Happiness,  as  I  have  experienced  in  other 
periods  of  my  life,  deep,  domestic  happiness,  makes  a  man 
comparative  careless  of  ridicule,  of  sarcasm,  or  of  abuse. 
But  calamity  —  the  degradation  in  the  world's  eye,  of 
every  man  who  is  fighting  with  pecuniary  difficulties  — 
exasperates  beyond  all  that  can  be  imagined,  a  man*8 
sensibility  to  insult.  He  is  even  apprehensive  of  insult  — 
tremulously,  fantastically  apprehensive,  where  none  is  in- 
tended ;  and  like  Wordsworth's  shepherd,  with  his  very 
understanding  consciously  abused  and  depraved  by  his 
misfortunes,  is  ready  to  say,  at  all  hours  — 

*  And  every  man  I  met  or  faced, 
Methought  he  knew  some  ill  of  me.* 

8.  me  notice,  perhaps,  the  newspaper  had  taken  of  this 
new  satirical  journal,  or  some  extracts  might  have  been 
made  from  it ;  at  all  events,  I  had  ascertained  its  character 
80  well  that,  in  this  respect,  I  had  nothing  to  learn.  It 
now  remained  to  get  the  number  which  professed  to  be 
seasoned  with  my  particular  case  ;  and  it  may  be  sup- 
posed th&t  I  did  not  loiter  over  my  breakfast  after  this 


LIBELLOUS  ATTACK  BY  A  LONDON  JOURNAL.  677 

liscovery.  Something  which  I  saw  or  suspected  amongst 
the  significant  hints  of  a  paragraph  or  advertisement, 
made  me  fear  that  there  might  possibly  be  insinuations  or 
downright  assertion  in  the  libel  requiring  instant  public 
notice  ;  and,  therefore,  on  a  motive  of  prudence,  had  I 
even  otherwise  felt  that  indifference  for  slander  which  now 
I  do  feel,  but  which,  in  those  years,  morbid  irritability  of 
temperament  forbade  m.e  to  affect,  I  should  still  have 
thought  it  right  to  look  after  the  work ;  which  now  I  did  : 
and,  by  nine  o'clock  in  the  morning  —  an  hour  at  which 
few  people  had  seen  me  for  years  —  I  was  on  my  road  to 
Smithfield.  Smithfield  ?  Yes ;  even  so.  All  known  and 
respectable  publishers  having  declined  any  connection 
with  the  work,  the  writers  had  facetiously  resorted  to  this 
aceldama,  or  slaughtering  quarter  of  London  —  to  these 
vast  shambles,  as  typical,  I  suppose,  of  their  own  slaugh- 
tering spirit.  On  my  road  to  Smithfield,  I  could  not  but 
pause  for  one  moment  to  reflect  on  the  pure  defecated 
malice  which  must  have  prompted  an  attack  upon  myself, 
Retaliation  or  retort  it  could  not  pretend  to  be.  To  most 
literary  men,  scattering  their  written  reviews,  or  their 
opinions,  by  word  or  mouth,  to  the  right  and  the  left  with 
all  posfible  carelessness,  it  never  can  be  matter  of  sur- 
prise, or  altogether  of  complaint,  (unless  a  question  of 
iegrees,)  that  angry  notices,  or  malicious  notices,  should 
le  taken  of  themselves.  Few,  indeed,  of  literary  men 
can  pretend  to  any  absolute  innocence  from  offence,  and 
.from  such  even  as  may  have  seemed  deliberate.  But  I, 
for  my  part,  could.  Knowing  the  rapidity  with  which  all 
remarks  of  literary  men  upon  literary  men  are  apt  to 
circulate,  I  had  studiously  and  resolutely  forborne  to  say 
anything,  whether  of  a  writer  or  a  book,  unless  where  it 
happened  that  I  could  say  something  that  would  be  felt  as 
tomplimentary.    And  as  to  written  reviews,  so  much  did 


678 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


I  dislike  tf-e  assumption  of  judicial  functions  and  authority 
over  the  works  of  my  own  brother  authors  and  contem- 
poraries,  that  I  have,  in  my  whole  life,  written  only  two ; 
at  that  time  only  one ;  and  that  one,  though  a  review  of 
an  English  novel,  was  substantially  a  review  of  a  German 
book,  taking  little  notice,  or  none,  of  the  English  trans- 
lator ;  for,  although  he,  a  good  German  scholar  now,  was 
a  very  imperfect  one  at  that  time,  and  was,  therefore, 
every  way  open  to  criticism,  I  had  evaded  this  invidious 
office  applied  to  a  novice  in  literature,  and  (after  pointing 
out  one  or  two  slight  blemishes  of  trivial  importance)  all 
that  I  said  of  a  general  nature  was  a  compliment  to  him 
upon  the  felicity  of  his  verses.  Upon  the  German  author 
I  was,  indeed,  severe,  but  hardly  as  much  as  he  deserved. 
The  other  review  was  a  tissue  of  merriment  and  fun  ;  and 
though,  it  is  true,  I  did  hear  that  the  fair  authoress  was 
offended  at  one  jest,  I  may  safely  leave  it  for  any  reader 
to  judge  between  us.  She,  or  her  brother,  amongst  other 
Latin  epigrams,  had  one  addressed  to  a  young  lady  upon 
the  loss  of  her  keys.  This,  the  substance  of  the  lines 
showed  to  have  been  the  intention  ;  but  (by  a  very  venial 
error  in  one  who  was  writing  Latin  from  early  remem- 
brance of  it,  and  not  in  the  character  of  a  professing 
scholar)  the  title  was  written  De  clavis  instead  of  De 
clavihus  amissis ;  upon  which  I  observed  that  the  writer 
had  selected  a  singular  topic  for  condolence  with  a  young 
lady,  —  viz.  'on  the  loss  of  her  cudgels;'  {clavis,  as  an 
ablative,  coming  clearly  from  clava.)  This  (but  I  can 
hardly  believe  it)  was  said  to  have  offended  Miss  H. ;  and, 
at  all  events,  this  was  the  extent  of  my  personalities. 
Many  kind  things  I  had  said  ;  much  honor,  much  admira- 
Mon,  I  had  professed  at  that  period  of  my  life  in  occa- 
8i;)nal  papers  or  private  letters,  towards  many  of  my 
contemporaries,  but  never  anything  censorious  or  harsh ; 


LIBELl.OUS  ATTACK  7\Y  A  LONDON  JOURNAL.  679 

and  simply  on  a  principle  of  courteous  forbearance  which 
I  have  felt  to  be  due  towards  those  who  are  brothers  of 
the  same  liberal  profession  with  one's  self.  I  could  not 
feel,  when  reviewing  my  whole  life,  that  in  any  one 
instance,  by  act,  by  word,  or  by  intention,  I  had  offered 
any  unkindness,  far  less  any  wrong  or  insult,  towards  a 
brother  author.  I  was  at  a  loss,  therefore,  to  decipher  the 
impulse  under  which  the  malignant  libeller  could  have 
written,  in  making  (as  I  suspected  already)  my  private 
history  the  subject  of  his  calumnies.  Jealousy,  I  have 
since  understood,  jealousy,  was  the  foundation  of  the 
•whole.  A  little  book  of  mine  had  made  its  way  into 
drawing-rooms,  where  some  book  of  his  had  not  been 
heard  of. 

On  reaching  Smithfield,  I  found  the  publisher  to  be  a 
medical  bookseller,  and,  to  my  surprise,  having  every 
appearance  of  being  a  grave,  respectable  man  ;  notwith- 
standing this  undeniable  fact,  that  the  libellous  journal,  to 
which  he  thought  proper  to  affix  his  sanction,  trespassed 
on  decency,  not  only  by  its  slander,  but,  in  some  in- 
stances, by  downright  obscenity ;  and,  worse  than  that,  by 
prurient  solicitations  to  the  libidinous  imagination,  through 
blanks,  seasonably  interspersed.  I  said  nothing  to  him  in 
the  way  of  inquiry  ;  for  I  easily  guessed  that  the  knot  of 
writers  who  were  here  clubbing  their  virus,  had  not  so  ill 
combined  their  plans  as  to  leave  them  open  to  detection 
by  a  question  from  any  chance  stranger.  Having,  there- 
fore, purchased  a  set  of  the  journal,  then  amounting  to 
ihree  or  four  numbers,  I  went  out ;  and  in  the  elegant 
promenades  of  Smithfield,  I  read  the  lucubrations  of  my 
libeller.  Fit  academy  for  such  amenities  of  literature  ! 
Fourteen  years  have  gone  by  since  then  ;  and,  possibly, 
the  unknown  hound  who  yelled,  on  that  occasion,  among 
^his  kennel  of  curs,  may,  long  since,  have  buried  himself 


680 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


and  his  malice  in  the  grave.  Suffice  it  here  to  say,  that 
calm  as  I  am  now,  and  careless  on  recalling  the  remem- 
brance of  this  brutal  libel,  at  that  time  I  was  convulsed 
with  wiath.  As  respected  myself,  there  was  a  depth  of 
malignity  in  the  article  which  struck  me  as  perfectly 
mysterious.  How  could  any  man  have  made  an  enemy 
so  profound,  and  not  even  have  suspected  it  ?  That 
puzzled  me.  For,  with  respect  to  the  other  objects  of 
attack,  such  as  Sir  Humphry  Davy,  &c.,  it  was  clear 
that  the  malice  was  assumed  ;  that,  at  most,  it  was  the 
gay  impertinence  of  some  man  upon  town,  armed  with 
triple  Irish  brass  from  original  defect  of  feeling,  and 
willing  to  raise  an  income  by  running  amuck  at  any 
person  just  then  occupying  enough  of  public  interest  to 
make  the  abuse  saleable.  But,  in  my  case,  the  man  flew 
like  a  bull-dog  at  the  throat,  with  a  pertinacity  and 
acharnement  of  malice  that  would  have  caused  me  to 
laugh  immoderately,  had  it  not  been  for  one  intolerable 
wound  to  my  feelings.  These  mercenary  libellers,  whose 
stiletto  is  in  the  market,  and  at  any  man's  service  for  a 
fixed  price,  callous  and  insensible  as  they  are,  yet  retain 
enough  of  the  principles  common  to  human  nature,  under 
every  modification,  to  know  where  to  plant  their  wounds. 
Like  savage  hackney  coachmen,  they  know  where  there 
is  a  raw.  And  the  instincts  of  human  nature  teach  them 
that  every  man  is  vulnerable  through  his  female  con- 
nections. There  lies  his  honor  ;  there  his  strength  ;  there 
iiis  weakness.  In  their  keeping  is  the  heaven  of  his 
happiness  ;  in  them  and  through  them  the  earthy  of  its 
fragility.  Many  there  are  who  do  not  feel  the  maternal 
i  elation  to  be  one  in  which  any  excessive  freight  of  honor 
or  sensibility  is  embarked.  Neither  is  the  name  of  sister 
though  tender  in  early  years,  and  impressive  to  the  fire- 
tide  sensibilities,  universally  and  through  life  the  samo 


LIBELLOUS  ATTACK  B\    A  LONDON  JOURNAL.  681 

magical  sound.  A  sister  is  a  creature  whose  very  pro- 
perty and  tendency  {qua  sister)  is  to  alienate  herself,  not 
to  gather  round  your  centre.  But  the  names  of  wife  and 
daughter,  these  are  the  ^supreme  and  starry  charities  of 
life  :  and  he  who,  undei  a  mask,  fighting  in  darkness, 
attacks  you  there,  that  coward  has  you  at  disadvantage. 
I  stood  in  those  hideous  shambles  of  Smithfield  :  upwards 
I  looked  to  the  clouds,  downwards  to  the  earth,  for  ven- 
geance. I  trembled  with  excessive  wrath  —  such  was  my 
infirmity  of  feeling  at  that  time,  and  in  that  condition  of 
health ;  and  had  I  possessed  forty  thousand  lives,  all,  and 
every  one  individually,  I  would  have  sacrificed  in  vindi- 
cation of  her  that  was  thus  cruelly  libelled.  Shall  I  give 
currency  to  his  malice,  shall  I  aid  and  promote  it  by 
repeating  it  ?  No.  And  yet  why  not  ?  Why  should  I 
scruple,  as  if  afraid  to  challenge  his  falsehoods  ?  —  why 
should  I  scruple  to  cite  them?  He,  this  libeller,  asserted 
—  But  faugh ! 

This  slander  seemed  to  have  been  built  upon  some  spe- 
cial knowledge  of  me ;  for  I  had  often  spoken  with  horror 
of  those  who  could  marry  persons  in  a  condition  which 
obliged  them  to  obedience  —  a  case  which  had  happened 
repeatedly  within  my  own  knowledge  ;  and  I  had  spoken 
on  this  ground,  that  the  authority  of  a  master  might  be 
supposed  to  have  been  interposed,  whether  it  really  were 
BO  or  not,  in  favor  of  his  designs  ;  and  thus  a  presumption, 
however  false  it  might  be,  always  remained  that  his  woo- 
ing had  been,  perhaps,  not  the  wooing  of  perfect  freedom, 
BO  essential  to  the  dignity  of  woman,  and,  therefore,  es- 
•lential  to  his  own  dignity  ;  but  that,  perhaps,  it  had  been 
i^vored  by  circumstances,  and  by  opportunities  created, 
if  it  had  not  even  been  favored,  by  express  exertions  of 
tuthority.  The  libeller,  therefore,  did  seem  to  have 
•ome  knowledge  of  my  peculiar  opinions  ;  yet,  in  other 


682 


XITEKARY  REMINISCENCES. 


points,  either  from  sincere  ignorance  or  from  afFectatioa 
and  by  way  of  turning  aside  suspicion,  he  certainly 
manifcFted  a  non-acquainance  with  facts  relating  to  me 
that  must  have  been  familiar  enough  to  all  within  my 
circle. 

Let  me  pursue  the  case  to  its  last  stage.  The  reader 
will  say,  perhaps,  Why  complain  of  a  paltry  journal  that 
assuredly  never  made  any  noise  ?  for  I,  the  reader,  never 
heard  of  it  till  now.  No,  that  is  very  possible  ;  for  the 
truth  is,  and  odd  enough  it  seems,  this  malicious  journal 
prospered  so  little,  that,  positively,  at  the  seventh  No.  it 
stopped.  Laugh  I  did,  and  laugh  I  could  not  help  but  do, 
at  this  picture  of  baffled  malice  ;  writers  willing  and  ready 
to  fire  with  poisoned  bullets,  and  yet  perfectly  unable  to 
get  an  effective  aim,  from  sheer  want  of  co-operation  on 
the  part  of  the  public. 

However,  the  case  as  it  respected  me,  went  farther  than 
it  did  with  respect  to  the  public.  Would  it  be  believed 
that  human  malice,  with  respect  to  a  man  not  even  known 
by  sight  to  his  assailants,  as  was  clear  from  one  part  of 
their  personalities,  finally  —  that  is  to  say,  months  after- 
wards —  adopted  the  following  course  :  —  The  journal  had 
Bunk  under  public  scorn  and  neglect ;  neglect  at  first, 
but,  perhaps,  scorn  at  the  last ;  for,  when  the  writers 
found  that  mere  malice  availed  not  to  draw  public  atten- 
tion, they  adopted  the  plan  of  baiting  their  hooks  with 
obscenity  ;  and  they  published  a  paper,  professing  to  be 
written  by  Lord  Byron,  called,  *  My  Wedding  Night ; 
and  very  possible,  from  internal  evidence,  to  have  been 
really  written  by  him ;  and  yet  the  combined  forces  of 
Byron  and  obscenity  failed  to  save  them  —  which  is  rather 
remarkable.  Having  sunk,  one  might  suppose  the  journal 
was  at  an  end,  for  good  and  evil ;  and,  especially,  that  aL 
who  had  been  molested  by  it,  or  held  up  to  ridicule,  might 


LIBELLOUS  ATTACK  BY  A  LONDON  JOURNAL.  683 

now  calculate  on  rest.  By  no  means  :  First  of  all  they 
made  inquiries  about  the  localities  of  my  residence,  and 
the  town  nearest  to  my  own  family.  Nothing  was  effected 
unless  they  carried  the  insult,  addressed  to  my  family, 
into  the  knowledge  of  that  family  and  its  circle.  My  cot- 
tage in  Grasmere  was  just  280  miles  from  London,  and 
eighteen  miles  from  any  town  whatsoever.  The  nearest 
was  Kendal,  a  place  of  perhaps  16,000  inhabitants;  and 
the  nearest,  therefore,  at  which  there  were  any  newspa- 
pers printed.  There  were  two ;  one  denominated  The 
Gazette;  the  other  The  Chronicle.  The  first  was  Tory 
and  Conservative ;  had  been  so  from  its  foundation ;  and 
vv'as,  besides,  generous  in  its  treatment  of  private  charac- 
ter. My  own  contributions  to  it  I  will  mention  hereafter. 
The  Chronicle^  on  the  other  hand,  was  a  violent  reforming 
journal,  and  conducted  in  a  partisan  spirit.  To  this  news- 
paper the  article  was  addressed;  by  this  newspaper  it 
was  published ;  and  by  this  it  was  carried  into  my  own 
*  nea:^-c?oor '  neighborhood.  Next-door  neighborhood  ?  But 
that  surely  must  be  the  very  best  direction  these  libellers 
could  give  to  their  malice;  for  there,  at  least,  the  false- 
hood of  their  malice  must  be  notorious.  Why,  yes  :  and 
in  that  which  was  my  neighborhood,  according  to  the 
most  literal  interpretation  of  the  term,  a  greater  favor 
could  not  have  been  done  me,  nor  a  more  laughable  hu- 
miliation for  my  unprovoked  enemies.  Commentary  oi 
refutation  there  needed  none ;  the  utter  falsehood  of  the 
main  allegations  was  so  obvious  to  every  man,  woman, 
and  child,  that,  of  necessity,  it  discredited  even  those 
parts  which  might,  for  any  thing  known  to  my  neighbors, 
have  been  true.  Nay,  it  was  the  means  of  procuring  for 
me  a  generous  expression  of  sympathy,  that  would  else 
have  been  wanting  ;  for  some  gentlemen  of  the  neighbor^ 
!iood,  who  were  but  sh'ghtly  known  to  me,  put  the  malig* 


684 


LITEHART  REMINISCENCES, 


nant  journal  into  the  fire  at  a  public-reading-room.  So 
far  was  well ;  but,  on  the  other  hand,  in  Kendal,  a  town 
nearly  twenty  miles  distant,  of  necessity  I  was  but  imper- 
fectly known ;  and  though  there  was  a  pretty  general  ex- 
pression of  disgust  at  the  character  of  the  publication  and 
the  wanton  malignity  which  it  bore  upon  its  front,  since, 
true  or  not  true,  no  shadow  of  a  reason  was  pleaded  for 
thus  bringing  forward  statements  expre^^^ly  to  injure  me,  or 
to  make  me  unhappy;  yet  there  must  have  been  many, 
in  so  large  a  place,  who  had  too  little  interest  in  the  ques- 
tion, or  too  limited  means  of  inquiry,  for  ever  ascertaining 
the  truth.  Consequently,  in  their  minds,  to  this  hour,  my 
name,  as  one  previously  known  to  them,  and  repeatedly 
before  the  town  in  connection  with  political  or  literary  arti- 
cles in  their  conservative  journals,  must  have  suffered. 

But  the  main  purpose  for  which  I  have  reported  the 
circumstances  of  these  two  cases,  relates  to  the  casuistry 
of  duelling.  Casuistry,  as  I  have  already  said,  is  the 
moral  philosophy  of  cases  —  that  is,  of  anomalous  combi- 
nations of  circumstances  —  that,  for  any  reason  whatso- 
ever, do  not  fall,  or  do  not  seem  to  fall,  under  the  general 
rules  of  morality.  As  a  general  rule,  it  must,  doubtless, 
be  unlawful  to  attempt  another  man's  life,  or  to  hazard 
your  own.  Very  special  circumstances  must  concur  to 
make  out  any  case  of  exception ;  and  even  then  it  is  evi- 
dent that  one  of  the  parties  must  always  be  deeply  in 
the  wrong.  But  it  does  strike  me,  that  the  present  casu- 
istry of  society  upon  the  question  of  duelling  is  pro- 
foundly wrong,  and  wrong  by  manifest  injustice.  Very 
little  distinction  is  ever  made,  in  practice,  by  those  who 
lipply  their  judgments  to  such  cases,  between  the  man 
who,  upon  principle,  practises  the  most  cautious  self-re- 
-jtraint  and  moderation  in  his  daily  demeanor,  never  undei 
iuy  circumstances  offering  an  insult,  or  any  just  occasion 


LIBEIiLOTJS  ATTACK  BY  A  LONDON  JOURNAL.  685 

of  qua»:rel,  and  resorting  to  duel  only  under  the  most  in* 
BufFerable  provocation,  between  this  man,  on  the  one  side, 
and  the  most  wanton  ruffian,  on  the  other,  who  makes  a 
common  practice  of  playing  ufcn  other  men's  feelings, 
whether  in  reliance  upon  superior  bodily  strength,  or  upon 
the  pacific  disposition  of  conscientious  men,  and  fathers 
of  families.  Yet,  surely,  the  difference  between  them 
goes  the  whole  extent  of  the  interval  between  wrong  and 
right.  Even  the  question,  'Who  gave  the  challenge?' 
which  is  sometimes  put,  often  merges  virtually  in  the 
transcendent  question,  '  Who  gave  the  provocation  ? ' 
For  it  is  important  to  observe,  in  both  the  cases  which  I 
have  reported,  that  the  onus  of  offering  the  challenge  was 
thrown  upon  the  unoffending  party ;  and  thus,  in  a  legal 
sense,  that  party  is  made  to  give  the  provocation  who,  in 
a  moral  sense,  received  it.  But  surely,  if  even  the  law 
makes  allowances  for  human  infirmity,  when  provoked 
beyond  what  it  can  endure,  —  we,  in  our  brotherly  judg- 
ments upon  each  other,  ought,  d  fortiori,  to  take  into  the 
equity  of  our  considerations  the  amount  and  quality  of  the 
offence.  It  will  be  objected  that  the  law,  so  far  from  allow- 
ing for,  expressly  refuses  to  allow  for,  sudden  sallies  of 
anger  or  explosions  of  vindictive  fury,  unless  in  so  far  as 
they  are  extempore,  and  before  the  reflecting  judgment 
has  had  time  to  recover  itself.  Any  indication  that  the 
party  had  leisure  for  calm  review,  or  for  cool  selection 
of  means  and  contrivances  in  executing  his  vindictive 
purposes,  will  be  fatal  to  a  claim  of  that  nature.  This  is 
true  ;  but  the  nature  of  a  printed  libel  is,  continually  to 
renew  itself  as  an  insult.  The  subject  of  it  reads  this 
libel,  perhaps,  in  solitude;  and,  by  a  great  exertion  of 
:  elf-cQ  nmand,  resolves  to  bear  it  with  fortitude  and  in 
•ilence.  Some  days  after,  in  a  public  room,  he  sees 
st'-angers  reading  it  also :  he  hears  them  scoffing  and 


686 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


laughing  loudly :  in  the  midst  of  all  this,  he  sees  himself 
pointed  out  to  their  notice  by  some  one  of  the  party  who 
happens  to  be  acquainted  with  his  person ;  and,  possibly, 
if  the  libel  take  that  particular  shape  which  excessive 
malice  is  most  likely  to  select,  he  will  hear  the  name  of 
some  female  relative,  dearer,  it  may  be  to  him,  and  more 
sacred  in  his  ears,  than  all  this  world  beside,  bandied 
about  with  scorn  and  mockery  by  those  who  have  not  the 
poor  excuse  of  the  original  libellers,  but  are,  in  fact, 
adopting  the  sesond-hand  malignity  of  others.  Such 
cases,  with  respect  to  libels  that  are  quickened  into 
popularity  by  interesting  circumstances,  or  by  a  personal 
interest  attached  to  any  of  the  parties,  or  by  wit,  or  by 
extraordinary  malice,  or  by  scenical  circumstances,  or  by 
circumstances  unusually  ludicrous,  are  but  too  likely  to 
occur ;  and,  with  every  fresh  repetition,  the  keenness  of 
the  original  provocation  is  renewed,  and  in  an  accelerated 
ratio. 

Again,  with  reference  to  my  own  case,  or  to  any  case 
resembling  that,  let  it  be  granted  that  I  was  immoderately 
and  unreasonably  transported  by  anger  at  the  moment ;  — 
I  thought  so  myself,  after  a  time,  when  the  journal  which 
published  the  libel  sank  under  the  public  neglect;  but 
this  was  an  after  consideration ;  and,  at  the  moment,  how 
heavy  an  aggravation  was  given  to  the  stings  of  the  malice, 
by  the  deep  dejection,  from  embarrassed  circumstances 
and  from  disordered  health,  which  then  possessed  me : 
aggravations,  perhaps,  known  to  the  libellers  as  encour- 
agements for  proceeding  at  the  time,  and  often  enough 
likely  to  exist  in  other  men's  cases.  Now,  in  the  case 
as  it  actually  occurred,  it  so  happened  that  the  malicious 
writers  had,  by  the  libel,  dishonored  themselves  too  deeply 
m  ^he  public  opinion,  to  venture  upon  coming  forward,  in 
their  own  persons,  to  avow  their  own  work ;  but  suppose 


LIBELLOUS  ATTACK  BY  A  LONDON  JOURNAL.      (I  7 

them  to  have  done  so,  as,  in  fact,  even  in  this  case,  tl.ey 
might  have  done,  had  they  not  published  their  intention  of 
driving  a  regular  trade  in  libel  and  in  slander ;)  suppose 
them  insolently  to  beard  you  in  public  haunts  ;  to  cross 
your  path  continually  when  in  company  with  the  very 
female  relative  upon  whom  they  had  done  their  best  to 
point  the  finger  of  public  scorn  ;  and  suppose  them  fur- 
ther, by  the  whole  artillery  of  contemptuous  looks,  words, 
gestures,  and  unrepressed  laughter,  to  republish,  as  it 
were,  ratify,  and  publicly  to  apply,  personally,  their  own 
original  libel,  as  often  as  chance  or  as  opportunity  (eagerly 
improved)  should  throw  you  together  in  places  of  general 
resort ;  and  suppose,  finally,  that  the  central  figure  —  nay, 
in  their  account,  the  very  butt  throughout  this  entire 
drama  of  malice  —  should  chance  to  be  an  innocent, 
gentle-hearted,  dejected,  sufiering  woman,  utterly  un- 
known to  her  persecutors,  and  selected  as  their  martyr 
merely  for  her  relationship  to  yourself  —  suppose  her, 
in  short,  to  be  your  wife  —  a  lovely  young  woman  sus- 
tained by  womanly  dignity,  or  else  ready  to  sink  into  the 
earth  with  shame,  under  the  cruel  and  unmanly  insults 
heaped  upon  her,  and  having  no  protector  on  earth  but 
yourself:  lay  all  this  together,  and  then  say  whether,  in 
such  a  case,  the  most  philosophic  or  the  most  Christian 
patience  might  not  excusably  give  way  ;  whether  flesh 
and  blood  could  do  otherwise  than  give  way,  and  seek 
redress  for  the  past,  but,  at  all  events,  security  for  the 
future,  in  what,  perhaps,  might  be  the  sole  course  open  to 
you  —  an  appeal  to  arms. 

Let  it  not  be  said  that  the  case  here  proposed,  by  way 
of  hypothesis,  is  an  extreme  one  :  for  the  very  argument 
has  contemplated  extreme  cases  :  since,  whilst  conceding 
that  duelling  is  an  unlawful  and  useless  remedy  for  cases 
^f  ordinary  wrong,  where  there  is  no  malice  to  resist  a 


688 


LITERAKY  EEMINISCENCES. 


more  conciliatory  mode  of  settlement,  and  where  it  ia 
difficult  to  imagine  any  deliberate  insult  except  such  as  is 
palliated  by  intoxication  —  conceding  this,  I  have  yel 
supposed  it  possible  that  cases  may  arise,  with  circum* 
stances  of  contumely  and  outrage,  growing  out  of  deep 
inexorable  malice,  which  cannot  be  redressed,  as  things 
now  are^  without  an  appeal  to  the  voye  de  fait.  '  But 
this  is  so  barbarous  an  expedient  in  days  of  high  civiliza- 
tion.' Why,  yes,  it  labors  with  the  semi-barbarism  of 
chivalry  :  yet,  on  the  other  hand,  tbis  mention  of  chivalry 
reminds  me  to  say,  that  if  this  practice  of  duelling  share 
the  blame  of  chivalry,  one  memorable  praise  there  is, 
which  also  it  may  claim  as  common  to  them  both.  It  is 
a  praise  which  I  have  often  insisted  on  ;  and  the  very 
sublime  of  prejudice  I  would  challenge  to  deny  it. 
Burke,  in  his  well  known  apology  for  chivalry,  thus 
expresses  his  sense  of  the  immeasurable  benefits  which 
it  conferred  upon  society,  as  a  supplementary  code  of 
law,  reaching  those  cases  which  the  weakness  of  muni- 
cipal law  was  then  unavailing  to  meet,  and  at  a  price  so 
trivial  in  bloodshed  or  violence — he  calls  it  '  the  cheap 
defence  of  nations.'  Yes,  undoubtedly  ;  and  surely  the 
same  praise  belongs  incontestably  to  the  law  of  duelling. 
For  one  duel  in  esse,  there  are  ten  thousand,  every  day 
of  our  lives,  amid  populous  cities,  in  posse :  one  challenge 
is  given,  a  myriad  are  feared  :  one  life  (and  usually  the 
most  worthless,  by  any  actual  good  rendered  to  society) 
is  sacrificed,  suppose  triennially,  from  a  nation  ;  every  life 
is  endangered  by  certain  modes  of  behavior.  Hence^ 
then,  and  at  a  cost  inconceivably  trifling,  the  peace  of 
society  is  maintained  in  cases  which  no  law,  no  severity 
of  police,  ever  could  effectually  reach.  Brutal  strength 
would  reign  paramount  in  the  walks  of  public  life; 
orutal  intoxication  would  follow  out  its  lawless  impulsea. 


LIBELLOUS  ATTACK  BY  A  LONDON  JOURNAL.  689 

Were  it  not  for  the  fear  which  now  is  always  in  the  rear 
the  fear  of  being  summoned  to  a  strict  summary 
account,  liable  to  the  most  perilous  consequences.  This 
is  not  open  to  denial  :  the  actual  basis  upon  which  reposea 
the  security  of  us  all,  the  peace  of  our  wives  and  our 
daughters,  and  our  own  immunity  from  the  vilest  degra 
dations  under  their  eyes,  is  the  necessity,  known  to  every 
gentleman,  of  answering  for  his  outrages  in  a  way  which 
strips  him  of  all  unfair  advantages,  except  one,  (which  is 
not  often  possessed,)  which  places  the  weak  upon  a  level 
with  the  strong,  and  the  quiet  citizen  upon  a  level  with 
the  military  adventurer,  or  the  ruffian  of  the  gambling- 
house.  The  fact,  I  say,  cannot  be  denied  ;  neither  can 
the  low  price  be  denied  at  which  this  vast  result  is 
obtained.  And  it  is  evident  that,  on  the  principle  of 
expediency,  adopted  as  the  basis  of  morality  by  Paley, 
the  justification  of  duelling  is  complete  :  for  the  greatest 
Bum  of  immediate  happiness  is  produced  at  the  least 
possible  sacrifi'^e.^'    But  there  are  many  men  of  high 

*  Neither  would  it  be  open  to  Paley  to  plead  that  the  final  or  re 
motest  consequences  must  be  taken  into  the  calculation ;  and  that  one 
of  these  would  be  the  weakening  of  all  moral  sanctions,  and  thus, 
indirectly,  an  injury  to  morality;  which  might  more  than  compen- 
sate the  immediate  benefit  to  social  peace  and  security;  for  this  mode 
of  arguing  the  case  would  bring  us  back  to  the  very  principle  which 
his  own  implicitly,  or  by  involution,  rejects  :  since  it  would  tell  us  to 
obey  the  principle  itself  without  reference  to  the  apparent  conse- 
quences. By  the  by,  Paley  has  an  express  section  of  his  work  against 
the  law  of  honor  as  a  valid  rule  of  action;  but,  as  Cicero  says  of  Epi- 
curus, it  matters  little  what  he  says;  the  question  for  us  is  quam  Sbi 
convenienier ,  how  far  consistently  with  himself.  Now,  as  Sir  James 
Mackintosh  justly  remarks,  all  that  Paley  says  in  refutation  of  the 
principle  of  worldly  honor  is  hollow  and  unmeaning  In  fact,  it  is 
merely  one  of  the  commonplaces  adopted  by  satire,  and  no  philosophy 
Ikt  all.  Honor,  for  instance,  allows  you,  upon  paying  gambling 
debts,  to  neglect  oi  evade  all  others ;  honor,  again,  allows  you  to 
44 


690 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


moral  principle,  and  yet  not  professing  to  rest  upoa 
Christianity,  who  reject  this  prudential  basis  of  ethics  as 
the  death  of  all  morality.  And  these  men  hold,  that  the 
social  recognition  of  any  one  out  of  the  three  following 
dangerous  and  immoral  principles,  viz. —  Ist^  That  a 
man  may  lawfully  sport  with  his  own  life  ;  2dly,  That  he 
may  lawfully  sport  with  the  life  of  another ;  SdJy,  That 
he  may  lawfully  seek  his  redress  for  a  social  wrong,  by 
any  other  channel  than  the  law  tribunals  of  the  land  : 
that  the  recognition  of  these,  or  any  of  them,  by  the 
jurisprudence  of  a  nation,  is  a  mortal  wound  to  the  very 
key-stone  upon  which  the  whole  vast  arch  of  morality 
reposes.  Well,  in  candor,  I  must  admit  that,  by  justify- 
ing, in  courts  of  judicature,  through  the  verdicts  of  juries, 
that  mode  of  personal  redress  and  self-vindication,  to  heal 
and  prevent  which  was  one  of  the  original  motives  for 
gathering  into  social  communities,  and  setting  up  an  em- 
pire of  public  law  as  paramount  to  all  private  exercise  of 
power,  a  fatal  wound  is  given  to  the  sanctity  of  moral 
right,  of  the  public  conscience,  and  of  law  in  its  elemen- 
tary field.  So  much  I  admit ;  but  I  say  also,  that  the  case 
arises  out  of  a  great  dilemma,  with  difficulties  on  both 
sides ;  and  that,  in  all  practical  applications  of  philosophy, 
amongst  materials  so  imperfect  as  men,  just  as  in  all  at- 
tempts to  realize  the  rigor  of  mathematical  laws  amongst 
earthly  mechanics,  inevitably  there  will  arise  such  dilem- 
mas and  cases  of  opprobrium  to  the  reflecting  intellect. 
However,  in  conclusion,  I  shall  say  four  things,  which  1 

eeduce  a  married  woman  ;  and  he  would  secretly  insinuate  that  honor 
enjoins  all  this;  but  it  is  evident  that  honor  simply  forbears  to  forbid 
all  this;  in  other  words,  it  is  a  very  limited  rule  of  action,  not  ap- 
plying to  one  case  of  conduct  in  fifty.  It  might  as  well  be  said,  that 
Ecclesiastical  Courts  sanction  murder^  because  that  crime  lies  out  of 
their  jurisdiction. 


LIBELLOUS  ATTACK  BY  A  LONDON  JOURNAL.  G91 

request  my  opponent,  whoever  lie  may  be,  to  consider  ; 
for  they  are  things  which  certainly  ought  to  have  weight ; 
and  some  important  errors  have  arisen  by  neglecting 
them. 

Firsty  Then,  let  him  remember  that  it  is  the  principle  at 
stake  —  viz.  the  recognition  by  a  legal  tribunal,  as  lawful 
or  innocent  of  any  attempt  to  violate  the  laws,  or  to  take 
the  law  into  our  own  hands  :  this  it  is,  and  the  mortal  taint 
which  is  thus  introduced  into  the  public  morality  of  a 
Christian  land,  thus  authentically  introduced  ;  thus  sealed 
and  countersigned  by  judicial  authority  ;  the  majesty  of 
law  actually  interfering  to  justify,  with  the  solemnities  of 
trial,  a  flagrant  violation  of  law  ;  this  it  is,  this  only,  and 
not  the  amount  of  injury  sustained  by  society,  which 
gives  value  to  the  question.  For,  as  to  the  injury,  I  have 
already  remarked,  that  a  very  trivial  annual  loss  —  one 
life,  perhaps,  upon  ten  millions,  and  that  life  as  often  as 
little  practically  valuable  as  any  amongst  us  —  that  pays 
our  fine  or  ransom  in  that  account.  And,  in  reality, 
there  is  one  popular  error  made  upon  this  subject,  when 
the  question  is  raised  about  the  institution  of  some  Court 
of  Honor,  or  Court  of  Appeal  in  cases  of  injury  to  the 
feelings,  under  the  sanction  of  Parliament,  which  satis- 
factorily demonstrates  the  trivial  amount  of  injury  sus- 
tained :  it  is  said  on  such  occasions,  that  de  minimis  non 
curat  lex  —  that  the  mischief,  in  fact,  is  too  narrow  and 
limited  for  the  regard  of  the  legislature.  And  we  may 
be  assured  that,  if  the  evil  were  ever  to  become  an 
extensive  one,  the  notice  of  Parliament  soon  would  be 
attracted  to  the  subject ;  and  hence  we  may  derive  a  hint 
for  an  amended  view  of  tne  policy  adopted  in  past  ages, 
princes  not  distinguished  for  their  religious  scruples, 
tnade  it,  in  different  ages  and  places,  a  capital  offence  to 
engage  in  a  duel :  whence  it  is  inferred,  falsely,  that,  ia 


692 


LITEEAKY  REMINISCENCES. 


former  times,  a  more  public  homage  was  paid  to  Christian 
principle.  But  the  fact  is,  that  not  the  anti-Christian 
character  of  the  offence  so  much  as  its  greater  frequency, 
and  the  consequent  extension  of  a  civil  mischief  was  the 
ruling  consideration  with  the  lawgiver.  Among  other 
causes  for  this  greater  prevalence  of  duels,  w^as  the 
composition  of  armies,  more  often  brought  together  upon 
mercenary  principles  from  a  large  variety  of  different 
nations,  whose  peculiar  usages,  points  of  traditional  honor, 
and  even  the  oddness  of  their  several  languages  to  the 
ear,  formed  a  perpetual  occasion  of  insult  and  quarrel, 
Fluellen's  affair  with  Pistol,  we  may  be  sure,  was  no  rare 
but  a  representative  case. 

Secondly^  In  confirmation  of  what  I  have  said  about 
duelling,  as  the  great  conductor  for  carrying  off  the 
excess  of  angry  irritation  in  society,  I  will  repeat  what 
was  said  to  me  by  a  man  of  great  ability  and  distin- 
guished powers,  as  well  as  opportunities  for  observation, 
in  reference  to  a  provincial  English  town,  and  the  cabals 
which  prevailed  there.  These  cabals  —  some  political, 
arising  out  of  past  electioneering  contests  ;  some  muni- 
cipal, arising  out  of  the  corporation  disputes ;  some 
personal,  arising  out  of  family  rivalships,  or  old  tradi- 
tionary disputes  —  had  led  to  various  feuds  that  vexed 
the  peace  of  the  town  in  a  degree  very  considerably 
beyond  the  common  experience  of  towns  reaching  the 
same  magnitude.  How  was  this  accounted  for  ?  The 
word  tradesman  is,  more  than  even  the  term  middle  class^ 
liable  to  great  ambiguity  of  meaning  ;  for  it  includes  a 
range  so  large  as  to  take  in  some  who  tread  on  the  heels 
even  of  the  highest  aristocracy,  and  some  at  the  ether 
end,  who  rank  not  at  all  higher  than  day-laborers  or 
handicraftsmen.  Now,  those  who  ranked  with  gentle- 
wen,  took  the  ordinary  course  of  gentlemen  in  righting 


LIBELLOUS  ATTACK  BY  A  LONDON  JOrENAL.  693 

themselves  under  personal  insults  ;  and  the  result  was, 
that,  amongst  them  or  their  families,  no  feuds  were 
subsisting  of  ancient  standing.  No  ill  blood  was  nursed ; 
no  calumnies  or  conspicuous  want  of  charity  prevailed 
Not  that  they  often  fought  duels  :  on  the  contrary,  a  duel 
was  a  very  rare  event  amongst  the  indigenous  gentry  of 
the  place  ;  but  it  was  sufficient  to  secure  all  the  effects  of 
duelling,  that  it  was  known,  with  respect  to  this  class, 
that,  in  the  last  resort,  they  were  ready  to  fight.  Now, 
on  the  other  hand,  the  lowest  order  of  tradesmen  had  their 
method  of  terminating  quarrels  —  the  old  English  method 
of  their  fathers  —  viz.  by  pugilistic  contests.  And  they 
also  cherished  no  malice  against  each  other  or  amongst 
their  families.  '  But,'  said  my  informant,  '  some  of  those 
who  occupied  the  intermediate  stations  in  this  hierarchy 
of  trade,  found  themselves  most  awkwardly  situated.  So 
far  they  shared  in  the  refinements  of  modern  society,  that 
they  disdained  the  coarse  mode  of  settling  quarrels  by 
their  fists.  On  the  other  hand,  there  was  a  special  and 
peculiar  reason  pressing  upon  this  class,  which  restrained 
them  from  aspiring  to  the  more  aristocratic  modes  of 
fighting.  Thay  were  sensible  of  a  ridicule,  which  every- 
where attaches  to  many  of  the  less  elevated  or  liberal 
modes  of  exercising  trade  in  going  out  to  fight  with  sword 
and  pistol.  This  ridicule  was  sharpened  and  made  more 
effectual,  in  their  case,  from  the  circumstance  of  the 
Royal  Family  and  the  Court  making  this  particular  town 
a  frequent  place  of  residence.  Besides,  that,  apart  from 
the  ridicule,  many  of  them  depended  for  a  livelihood 
upon  the  patronage  of  royalty  or  of  the  nobility,  attached 
to  their  suite  ;  and  most  of  these  patrons  would  have 
resented  their  incrusion  upon  the  privileged  ground  of 
the  aristocracy  in  conducting  disputes  of  honor.  What 
vas  the  consequence  ?    These  persons,  having  no  natural 


^i94  LITERAKT  REMINISCENCES. 

outlet  for  their  wounded  sensibilties,  being  absolute^.^ 
debarred  from  any  mode  of  settling  their  disputes,  cher- 
ished inextinguishable  feuds  :  their  quarrels  in  fact  had 
no  natural  terminations  ;  and  the  result  was,  a  spirit  of 
malice  and  most  unchristian  want  of  charity,  which  could 
not  hope  for  any  final  repose,  except  in  death.'  Such 
was  the  report  of  my  observing  friend :  the  particular 
town  may  be  easily  guessed  at ;  and  I  have  little  doubt 
that  its  condition  continues  as  of  old. 

Thirdly,  It  is  a  very  common  allegation  against 
duelling,  that  the  ancient  Romans  and  Grecians  never 
practised  this  mode  of  settling  disputes  ;  and  the  infer- 
ence is,  of  course,  unfavorable,  not  to  Christianity,  but  to 
us  as  inconsistent  disciples  of  our  own  religion  ;  and  a 
second  inference  is,  that  the  principle  of  personal  honor, 
well  understood,  cannot  require  this  satisfaction  for  its 
wounds.  For  the  present  I  shall  say  nothing  on  the 
former  head,  but  not  for  want  of  something  to  say. 
With  respect  to  the  latter,  it  is  a  profound  mistake, 
founded  on  inacquaintance  with  the  manners  and  the 
spirit  of  manners  prevalent  amongst  these  imperfectly 
civilized  nations.  Honor  was  a  sense  not  developed  in 
many  of  its  modifications  amongst  either  Greeks  or 
Romans.  Cudgelling  was  at  one  time  used  as  the 
remedy  in  cases  of  outrageous  libel  and  pasquinade. 
But  it  is  a  point  very  little  to  the  praise  of  either  people, 
that  no  vindictive  notice  was  taken  of  any  possible 
personalities,  simply  because  the  most  hideous  license 
had  been  established  for  centuries  in  tongue  license  and 
unmanly  Billingsgate.  This  had  been  promoted  by  the 
example  hourly  ringing  in  their  ears  of  vernile  scurrility. 
Verna  —  that  is,  the  slave  born  in  the  family  —  had  each 
from  the  other  one  universal  and  proverbial  character  of 
foul-mouthed  eloquence,  which,  heard  from  infancy,  could 


LIBELLOUS  ATIACK  BY  A  LONDON  JOURNAL.  GOr) 


not  but  furDish  a  model  almost  unconsciously  to  those  who 
had  occasion  publicly  to  practise  vituperative  rhetoric. 
What  they  remembered  of  this  vernile  licentiousness, 
constituted  the  staple  of  their  talk  in  such  situations. 
And  the  horrible  illustrations  left  even  by  the  most 
accomplished  and  literary  of  the  Roman  orators,  of  their 
ihameles^  and  womanly  fluency  in  this  dialect  of  un- 
Icensed  abuse,  are  evidences,  not  to  be  resisted,  of  such 
obtuseness,  such  coarseness  of  feeling,  so  utter  a  defect 
of  all  the  gentlemanly  sensibilities,  that  no  man,  alive  to 
the  real  state  of  things  amongst  them,  would  ever  think 
of  pleading  their  example  in  any  other  view  than  as  an 
object  of  unmitigated  disgust.  At  all  events,  the  long- 
established  custom  of  deluging  each  other  in  the  Forum, 
or  even  in  the  Senate,  with  the  foulest  abuse,  the  prece- 
dent traditionally  delivered  through  centuries  before  the 
time  of  Caesar  and  Cicero,  had  so  robbed  it  of  its  sting, 
that,  as  a  subject  of  patient  endurance,  or  an  occasion 
for  self-conquest  in  mastering  the  feelings,  it  had  no 
merit  at  all.  Anger,  prompting  an  appeal  to  the  cudgel, 
there  might  be,  but  sense  of  wounded  honor,  requiring  a 
reparation  by  appeal  to  arms,  or  a  washing  away  by 
blood,  no  such  feeling  could  have  been  subdued  or  over- 
come by  a  Roman,  for  none  such  existed.  The  feelings 
of  wounded  honor  on  such  occasions,  it  will  be  allowed, 
ire  mere  reflections  (through  sympathetic  agencies)  of 
feelings  and  opinions  already  existing,  and  generally 
dispersed  through  society.  Now,  in  Roman  society,  the 
case  was  a  mere  subject  for  laughter;  for  there  were  no 
feelings  or  opinions  pointing  to  honor,  personal  honor 
as  a  principle  of  action,  nor,  consequently,  to  wounded 
honor  as  a  subject  of  complaint.  The  Romans  were 
not  above  duelling,  but  simply  not  up  to  that  level  of 
civilization. 


596 


LIIEBARY  REMINISCENCES. 


Finally^  With  respect  to  the  suggestion  of  a  Court  oj 
Honor y  much  might  be  said  that  my  limits  will  not  allow ; 
but  two  suggestions  I  will  make.  Firsts  Recurring  to  a 
thing  I  have  already  said,  I  must  repeat  that  no  justice 
would  be  shown,  unless  (in  a  spirit  very  different  from  that 
which  usually  prevails  in  society)  the  weight  of  public 
mdignation,  and  the  displeasure  of  the  court,  were  made 
to  settle  conspicuously  upon  the  aggressor  ;  not  upon  the 
challenger,  who  is  often  the  party  suffering  under  insuf- 
ferable provocation,  (provocation  which  even  the  sternness 
of  penal  law,  and  the  holiness  of  Christian  faith  allow  for,) 
but  upon  the  author  of  the  original  offence.  Secondly^ 
A  much  more  searching  inv'estigation  must  be  made  into 
^  the  conduct  of  the  seconds,  than  is  usual  in  the  unpro- 
fessional and  careless  inquisitions  of  the  public  into  such 
affairs.  Often  enough,  the  seconds  hold  the  fate  of  their 
principals  entirely  in  their  hsnds ;  and  instances  are  not  a 
few,  within  even  my  limited  knowdedge,  of  cases  where 
murder  has  been  really  committed,  not  by  the  party  who 
fired  the  fatal  bullet,  but  by  him  who  (having  it  in  his 
power  to  interfere  without  loss  of  honor  to  any  party)  has 
cruelly  thought  fit  —  [and,  in  some  instances,  apparently 
for  no  purpose  but  that  of  decorating  himself  with  the 
name  of  an  energetic  man,  and  of  producing  a  public 
'  sensation,^  as  it  is  called  —  a  sanguinary  affair]  —  to 
goad  on  the  tremulous  sensibility  of  a  mind  distracted 
between  the  sense  of  honor  on  the  one  hand,  and  the 
agonizing  claims  of  a  family  on  the  other,  into  fatal  ex- 
tremities that  might,  by  a  slight  concession,  have  he^n 
avoided.  I  could  mention  several  instances ;  but,  in  some 
of  these,  I  know  the  circumstances  only  by  report.  In 
one,  however,  I  had  my  information  from  parties  who 
were  personally  connected  with  the  unhappy  subject  of 
ke  aflfair.    The  case  was  this :  —  A  man  of  distinguished 


LIBELLOUS  ATTACK  BY  A  LONDON  JOURNAL.  697 

merit,  whom  I  shall  not  describe  more  particularly,  be- 
cause it  is  no  part  of  my  purpose  to  recall  old  buried  feuds, 
or  to  insinuate  any  personal  blame  whatsoever  (my  busi- 
ness being  not  with  this  or  that  man,  but  with  a  system 
and  its  principles)  ;  this  man,  by  a  step  well  meant,  but 
injudicious,  and  liable  to  a  very  obvious  misinterpretation, 
as  though  taken  in  a  view  of  self-interest,  had  entangled 
himself  in  a  quarrel.  That  quarrel  would  have  been  set- 
tled amicably,  or,  if  not  amicably,  at  least  without  blood- 
shed, had  it  not  been  for  an  unlucky  accident,  combined 
with  a  very  unwise  advice.  One  morning,  after  the  main 
dispute  had  been  pretty  well  adjusted,  he  was  standing  at 
the  fireside  after  breakfast,  talking  over  the  affair  so  fax 
as  it  had  already  travelled,  when  it  suddenly  and  most  un- 
happily came  into  his  head  to  put  this  general  question  — 
'  Pray,  does  it  strike  you  that  people  will  be  apt,  on  a 
review  of  this  whole  dispute,  to  think  that  there  has  been 
too  much  talking  and  too  little  doing  ? '  His  evil  genius 
so  ordered  it,  that  the  man  to  whom  he  put  this  question 
was  one  who,  having  no  military  character  to  rest  on, 
could  not  (or  thought  he  could  not)  recommend  those 
pacific  counsels  which  a  truly  brave  man  is  ever  ready  to 
suggest  —  I  put  the  most  friendly  construction  upon  his 
conduct  —  and  his  answer  was  this  —  '  Why,  if  you  in- 
sist upon  my  giving  a  faithful  reply,  if  you  will  require 
me  to  be  sincere,  (though  I  really  wish  you  would  not,) 
in  that  case  my  duty  is  to  tell  you,  that  the  world  has  been 
too  free  in  its  remarks  —  that  it  has,  with  its  usual  injus- 
tice, been  sneering  at  literary  men  and  paper  pellets^  as 
the  ammunition  in  which  they  trade ;  in  short,  my  dear 
friend,  the  world  has  presumed  to  say  that  not  you  only, 

but  that  both  parties,  have  shown  a  little  of*  *  Yes  ; 

I  know  what  you  are  going  to  say,'  interrupted  the  other, 
of  the  white  feather.    Is  it  not  fo  ?  *  —  Es^actly ;  ycu 


698 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


bave  hit  the  mark  —  that  is  what  they  say.  But  how  un» 
just  it  is :  for,  says  I,  but  yesterday,  to  Mr.  L.  M.,  who 
was  going  on  making  himself  merry  with  the  affair,  in  a 

way  that  was  perfectly  scandalous  —  "  Sir,"  says  I,'  

but  this  says  I  never  reached  the  ears  of  the  unhappy 
man  :  he  had  heard  enough ;  and,  as  a  secondary  dispute 
was  still  going  on,  that  had  grown  out  of  the  first,  he  seized 
the  very  first  opening  which  offered  itself,  for  provoking 
the  issue  of  a  quarrel.  The  other  party  was  not  back- 
ward or  slack  in  answering  the  appeal ;  and  thus,  in  one 
morning,  the  prospect  was  overcast  —  peace  was  no  longer 
possible ;  and  a  hostile  meeting  was  arranged.  Even  at 
this  meeting,  much  still  remained  in  the  poAver  of  the 
seconds :  there  was  an  absolute  certainty  that  all  fatal 
consequences  might  have  been  evaded,  with  perfect  con- 
sideration for  the  honor  of  both  parties.  The  principals 
must  have  unquestionably  have  felt  that ;  but  if  the  seconds 
would  not  move  in  that  direction,  of  course  their  lips 
were  sealed.  A  more  cruel  situation  could  not  be  imag- 
ined ;  two  persons,  who  never,  perhaps,  felt  more  than 
that  fiction  of  enmity  which  belonged  to  the  situation,  that 
is  to  say,  assumed  the  enmity  which  society  presumes 
rationally  incident  to  a  certain  position  —  assumed  it  as  a 
point  of  honor,  but  did  not  heartily  feel  it ;  and  even  for 
the  slight  shade  of  animosity  which,  for  half  an  hour,  they 
might  have  really  felt,  had  thoroughly  quelled  it  before  the 
meeting;  these  two  persons  —  under  no  impulses  whatever, 
good  or  bad,  from  within,  but  purely  in  a  hateful  neces- 
sity of  servile  obedience  to  a  command  from  without- — 
prepared  to  perpetrate  what  must,  in  that  frame  of  dispas- 
sionate temper,  have  appeared  to  each,  a  purpose  of 
murder,  as  regarded  his  antagonist  —  a  purpose  o  ■  suicide, 
as  regarded  himself.  Simply  a  word,  barely  a  syllable, 
was  needed  from  the  'Friends'  (such  Friends!)  of  the 


LlliELLOUS  ATTACK  BY  A  LONDON  JOURNAL.  690 

parties,  to  have  delivered  them,  with  honor,  from  thiL 
dreadful  necessity :  that  word  was  not  spoken ;  and  be- 
cause a  breath,  a  motion  of  the  lips,  was  wanting  —  be- 
cause, in  fact,  the  seconds  were  thoughtless  and  without 
feeling,  one  of  the  parties  has  long  slept  in  a  premature 
grave  —  his  early  blossoms  scattered  to  the  wind  —  his 
olden  promise  of  fruit  blasted  ;  and  the  other  has  since 
lived  that  kind  of  life,  that,  in  my  mind,  he  was  happiel 
who  died.  Something  of  the  same  kind  happened  in  the 
duel  between  Lord  Camelford  and  his  friend,  Mr.  Best ; 
something  of  the  same  kind  in  that  between  Colonel  Mont- 
gomery and  Captain  Macnamara.  In  the  former  case,  the 
quarrel  was,  at  least,  for  a  noble  subject  ;  it  concerned  a 
woman.  But  in  the  latter,  a  dog,  and  a  thoughtless  lash 
applied  to  his  troublesome  gambols,  was  the  sole  subject 
of  dispute.  The  colonel,  as  is  well  known,  a  very  elegant 
and  generous  young  man,  fell  ;  and  Captain  Macnamara 
had  thenceforwards  a  worm  at  his  h^art,  whose  gnawings 
never  died.  He  was  a  post-captain ;  and  my  brother 
afterwards  sailed  with  him  in  quality  of  midshipman. 
From  him  I  have  often  heard  affecting  instances  of  the 
degree  in  which  the  pangs  of  remorse  had  availed,  to 
make  one  of  the  bravest  men  in  the  service  a  mere  panic- 
haunted,  and,  in  a  moral  sense,  almost  a  paralytic  wreck. 
He  that,  whilst  his  hand  was  unstained  with  blood,  would 
have  faced  an  army  of  fiends  in  discharge  of  his  duty,  nov/ 
fancied  danger  in  every  common  rocking  of  a  boat ;  he 
made  himself,  at  times,  the  subject  of  laughter  at  the 
messes  of  the  junior  and  more  thoughtless  officers  ;  and  his 
hand,  whenever  he  had  occasion  to  handle  a  spy-glass, 
shook,  (to  use  the  common  image,)  or,  rather,  shivered, 
\ike  an  aspen  tree.  Now,  if  a  regular  tribunal,  authenti- 
cated by  Parliament  as  the  fountain  of  law,  and  by  the 
Sovereign  as  the  fountain  of  honor,  were,  under  the  very 


700 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


aarrowest  constitution,  to  apply  itself  merely  to  a  review 
of  the  whole  conduct  pursued  by  the  seconds,  even  under 
this  restriction  such  a  tribunal  would  operate  with  great 
advantage.  It  is  needless  to  direct  any  severity  to  the 
conduct  of  the  principals,  unless  when  that  conduct  has 
been  outrageous  or  wanton  in  provocation  :  supposing  any 
thing  tolerably  reasonable  and  natural  in  the  growth  of  the 
quarrel,  after  the  quarrel  is  once  '  constituted,'  (to  borrow 
a  term  of  Scotch  law,)  the  principals,  as  they  are  called, 
with  relation  to  the  subject  of  dispute,  are  neither  princi- 
pals, nor  even  secondaries  for  the  subsequent  management 
of  the  dispute  :  they  are  delivered  up,  bound  hand  and 
foot,  into  the  hands  of  their  technical  '  friends  ; '  passive 
to  the  law  of  social  usage,  as  regards  the  general  necessity 
of  pursuing  the  dispute ;  passive  to  the  directions  of  their 
seconds,  as  regards  the  particular  mode  of  pursuing  it.  It 
is,  therefore,  the  seconds  who  are  the  proper  objects  of 
notice  for  courts  of  honor  ;  and  the  error  has  been,  in 
framing  the  project  of  such  a  court,  to  imagine  the  inquiry 
too  much  directed  upon  the  behavior  of  those  who  cease 
to  be  free  agents  from  the  very  moment  that  they  become 
liable  to  any  legal  investigation  whatever :  simply  as 
quarrellers,  the  parties  are  no  objects  of  question;  they 
are  not  within  the  field  of  any  police  review  ;  and  the 
very  first  act  which  brings  them  within  that  field,  trans- 
lates the  responsibility  (because  thu  free  agency)  froi» 
themselves  to  their  seconds.  The  whole  questio  vexata, 
therefore,  reduces  itself  to  these  logical  moments,  (to 
Fpeak  the  language  of  mathematics :)  the  two  parties 
mainly  concerned  in  the  case  of  duelling,  are  Society  and 
the  Seconds.  The  first,  by  authorizing  such  a  mode  of 
redress  ;  the  latter,  by  conducting  it.  Now,  I  presume,  it 
will  be  thought  hopeless  to  arraign  Society  at  the  bar  of 
any  earthly  court,  or  apply  any  censure  or  any  investiga- 


LIBELLOUS  ATTACK  BY  A  LONDON  JOURNAL.  701 


tion  to  its  mode  of  thinking.*  To  the  principals^  for  the 
reasons  given,  it  would  be  unjust  to  apply  them  :  and  the 
inference  is,  that  the  seconds  are  the  oarties  to  whom  their 
main  agency  should  be  directed  —  as  the  parties  in  whose 
hands  lies  the  practical  control  of  the  whole  affair,  and  the 
whole  machinery  of  opportunities,  (so  easily  improved  by 
a  wise  humanity)  —  for  sparing  bloodshed,  for  promoting 
reconciliation,  for  making  those  overtures  of  accommo- 
dation and  generous  apology,  which  the  brave  arc  so 

*  If  it  be  asked  by  what  title  I  represent  Society  as  authorizing 
(nay,  of  necessitating)  duels,  I  answer,  that  I  do  not  allude  to  any 
floating  opinions  of  influential  circles  in  society;  for  these  are  in 
continual  conflict,  and  it  may  be  difficult  even  to  guess  in  which 
direction  the  preponderance  would  lie.  I  build  upon  two  undeniable 
results,  to  be  anticipated  in  any  regular  case  of  duel,  and  supported 
by  one  uniform  course  of  precedent  :  —  Firsts  That  in  a  civil  adjudi- 
cation of  any  such  case,  assuming  only  that  it  has  been  fixirly  con- 
ducted, and  agreeably  to  the  old  received  usages  of  England,  no 
other  verdict  is  ever  given  by  a  jury  than  one  of  acquittal.  Secondly y 
That,  before  military  tribunals,  the  result  is  still  stronger;  for  the 
party  liable  to  a  challenge  is  not  merely  acquitted,  as  a  matter  of 
course,  if  he  accepts  it  with  any  issue  whatsoever,  but  is  positively 
dishonored  and  degraded  (nay,  even  dismissed  the  service,  virtually 
under  color  of  a  request  that  he  will  sell  out)  if  he  does  not.  These 
precedents  form  the  current  law  for  English  society,  as  existing 
amongst  gentlemen.  Duels,  pushed  a  Voutrancef  and  on  the  savage 
principles  adopted  by  a  few  gambling  ruffians  on  the  Continent,  (of 
which  a  good  description  is  given  in  the  novel  of  The  most  unforiu- 
note  Man  in  the  World,)  or  by  old  buccaneering  soldiers  of  Napo- 
leon, at  war  with  all  the  world,  and  in  the  desperation  of  cowardice, 
demanding  to  fight  in  a  saw-pit  or  across  a  table  —  this  sort  of  duels 
is  as  little  recognized  by  the  indulgence  of  English  law,  as,  in  the 
other  extreme,  the  mock  duels  of  German  Burschen  are  recognized 
by  the  gallantry  of  English  society.  Duels  of  the  latter  sort  would 
be  deemed  beneath  the  dignity  of  judicial  inquiry  :  duels  of  the  other 
Bort,  beyond  its  indulgence.  But  all  other  duels,  fairly  managed  in 
the  circumstances,  are  undeniably  privileged  amongst  non-military 
persons,  and  commanded  to  those  who  are  military. 


ro2 


LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 


ready  to  agree  to,  in  atonement  for  hasty  words  or  rash 
movements  of  passion,  but  which  it  is  impossible  for  them 
to  originate.  In  short,  for  impressing  the  utmost  possible 
spirit  of  humanizing  charity  and  forbearance  upon  a  prac- 
tice which,  after  all,  must  for  ever  remain  somewhat  of  an 
opprobrium  to  a  Christian  people  ;  but  which,  tried  by  the 
law  of  worldly  wisdom,  is  the  finest  bequest  of  chivalry, 
the  most  economic  safety-valve  for  man's  malice,  that 
man's  wit  could  devise  ;  the  most  absolute  safeguard  of 
the  weak  against  the  brutal ;  and,  finally,  (once  more  to 
borrow  the  words  of  Burke,)  in  a  sense  the  fullest  and 
most  practical,  '  the  cheap  defence  of  nations ; '  not  in- 
deed against  the  hostility  which  besieges  from  without^ 
but  against  the  far  more  operative  nuisance  of  bad  pas- 
sions that  vex  and  molest  the  social  intercourse  of  men, 
by  ineradicable  impulses  from  within. 

I  may  illustrate  the  value  of  one  amongst  the  sugges- 
tions I  have  made,  by  looking  back  and  applying  it  to  part 
of  my  last  anecdote  :  the  case  of  that  promising  person 
who  was  cut  off  so  prematurely  for  himself,  and  so  ruin- 
ously for  the  happiness  of  the  surviving  antagonist.  I 
may  mention,  (as  a  fact  known  to  me  on  the  very  best 
authority,)  that  the  Duke  of  Wellington  was  consulted  by 
a  person  of  distinction,  who  had  been  interested  in  the 
original  dispute,  with  a  view  to  his  opinion  upon  the  total 
merits  of  the  afiair,  on  its  validity,  as  a  '  fighting '  quarrel, 
and  on  tne  behavior  of  the  parties  to  it.  Upon  the  last 
question,  the  opinion  of  his  Grace  was  satisfactory.  His 
bias,  undoubtedly,  if  he  has  any,  is  likely  to  lie  towards 
the  wisdom  of  the  peace-maker  ;  and  possibly,  like  many 
an  old  soldier,  he  may  be  apt  to  regard  the  right  of  pur- 
suing quarrels  by  arms  as  a  privilege  not  hastily  to  be 
extended  beyond  the  military  body.  But,  on  the  other 
question,  as  to  the  nature  of  the  quarrel,  the  duke  denied 


LIBELLOUS  ATTACK  BY  A  LONDON  JOURNAL.  703 


that  it  required  a  duel ;  or  that  a  duel  was  its  natural 
iolution.  And  had  the  duke  been  the  mediator,  it  ia 
highly  probable  that  the  unfortunate  gentleman  would 
now  have  been  living.  Certainly,  the  second  quarrel  in- 
volved far  less  of  irritating  materials  than  the  first.  It 
grew  out  of  a  hasty  word  and  nothing  more  ;  such  as 
drops  from  parliamentary  debaters  every  night  of  any  in- 
teresting discussion  —  drops  hastily,  is  as  hastily  recalled, 
or  excused,  perhaps,  as  a  venial  sally  of  passion,  either 
by  the  good  sense  or  the  magnanimity  of  the  party  inter- 
ested in  the  wrong.  Indeed,  by  the  unanimous  consent 
of  all  who  took  notice  of  the  affair,  the  seconds,  or  one 
of  them  at  least,  in  this  case,  must  be  regarded  as  deeply 
responsible  for  the  tragical  issue  ;  nor  did  I  he^r  of  one 
person  who  held  them  blameless,  except  that  one  who,  of 
all  others,  might  the  most  excusably  have  held  them  wrong 
in  any  result.  But  now,  from  such  a  case  brought  under 
the  review  of  a  court,  such  as  I  have  supposed,  and  im- 
proved in  the  way  I  have  suggested,  a  lesson  so  memora- 
ble might  have  been  given  to  the  seconds,  by  a  two  years' 
imprisonment  —  punishment  light  enough  for  the  wreck  of 
happiness  which  they  caused  —  that  soon,  from  this  single 
case,  raised  into  a  memorable  precedent,  there  would  have 
radiated  an  effect  upon  future  duels  for  half  a  century  to 
come.  And  no  man  can  easily  persuade  me  that  he  is  in 
earnest  about  the  extinction  of  duelling,  who  does  not 
lend  his  countenance  to  a  suggestion  which  would,  at  least, 
mitigate  the  worst  evils  of  the  practice,  and  would,  by 
placing  the  main  agents  in  responsibility  to  the  court, 
oring  the  duel  itself  immediately  under  the  direct  control 
of  that  court ;  would  make  a  legal  tribunal  not  reviewers 
Bubsequently,  but,  in  a  manner,  spectators  of  the  scene  ; 
md  would  carry  judicial  moderation  and  skill  into  th« 


704  LITERARY  REMINISCENCES. 

very  centre  of  angry  passions ;  not,  as  now  they  act,  in- 
efficiently to  review,  and,  by  implication,  sometimes  to 
approve  their  most  angry  ebullitions,  but  practically  to 
control  and  repress  them 


KOTEo. 


Note  1,  page  54. 

["  ilfr5.  Grant,^^  American  readers  will  especially  asso- 
ciate this  writer  with  her  entertaining  Memoirs  of  an  Amer- 
ican Lady."  If  De  Quincey  had  only  been  quick  enough  to 
cite  Milton  in  explanation,  the  good  lady  would  have  at  once 
enrolled  him  amongst  her  friends.] 

Note  2,  page  158. 

I  HATE  somewhere  seen  it  remarked  with  respect  to  these 
charges  of  plagiarism,  that,  however  incontrovertible,  they 
did  not  come  with  any  propriety  or  grace  from  myself  as  the 
supposed  friend  of  Coleridge,  and  as  writing  my  sketch  of 
slight  reminiscences  on  the  immediate  suggestion  of  his  death. 
My  answer  is  this :  I  certainly  was  the  first  person  (first,  1 
1  relieve,  by  some  years)  to  point  out  the  plagiarisms  of  Coler- 
idge, and  above  all  others  that  circumstantial  plagiarism,  of 
which  it  is  impossible  to  suppose  him  unconscious,  from 
Schelling.  Many  of  his  plagiarisms  were  probably  uninten- 
tional, and  arose  from  that  confusion  between  things  floating 
in  the  memory  and  things  self-derived,  which  happens  at  times 
to  most  of  us  that  deal  much  with  books  on  the  one  hand, 
and  composition  on  the  other.  An  author  can  hardly  have 
written  much  and  rapidly,  who  does  not  sometimes  detect 
himself  and  perhaps,  therefore,  sometimes  fail  to  detect  himself, 
in  appropriating  the  thoughts,  images,  or  striking  expressions 
of  others.  It  is  enough  for  his  conscientious  self-justification 
that  he  is  anxiously  vigilant  to  guard  himself  from  such  un- 
acknowledged obligations,  and  forward  to  acknowledge  them 
18  soon  as  ever  they  are  pointed  out.    But  no  excess  of  candox 


06 


NOTES. 


the  most  indulgent  will  allow  us  to  suppose  that  a  most  pro- 
found speculation  upon  the  original  relations  inter  se  of  the 
Bubjective  and  the  objective,  literally  translated  from  the  Ger- 
man, and  stretching  over  some  pages,  could,  after  any  interval 
of  years,  come  to  be  mistaken  by  the  translator  for  his  own. 
This  amounted  to  an  entire  essay.  But  suppose  the  compass  of 
the  case  to  lie  within  a  single  word,  yet  if  that  word  were  so 
remarkable,  so  provocative  to  the  curiosity,  and  promising  so 
much  weight  of  meaning  (which  reasonably  any  great  departure 
from  ordinary  diction  must  promise),  as  the  word  esemp'astic,* 
we  should  all  hold  it  impossible  for  a  man  to  appropriate  this 

*  *Esemplasiic,'*  —  A  writer  in  *  Blackwood,'  who  carried  a  wrath 
into  the  discussion  for  which  I  and  others  found  it  hard  to  account, 
made  it  a  sort  of  charge  against  myself,  that  I  had  overlooked  this 
remarkable  case.  If  I  had^  there  would  have  been  no  particular 
reason  for  anger  or  surprise,  seeing  that  the  particular  German  work 
in  which  these  plagiarisms  were  traced,  had  been  lent  to  me  under 
most  rigorous  limitations  as  to  the  time  for  returning  it ;  the  owner 
of  the  volume  was  going  out  of  London,  and  a  very  few  hours  (ac- 
cording to  my  present  remembrance  only  two)  were  all  that  he  could 
allow  me  for  hunting  through  the  most  impracticable  of  metaphysical 
thickets,  (what  Coleridge  elsewhere  calls  *  the  holy  jungle  of  meta- 
physics.') Meantime  I  had  not  overlooked  the  case  of  esemplasiic  ; 
I  had  it  in  my  memory,  but  hurry  of  the  press,  and  want  of  room, 
obliged  me  to  omit  a  good  deal.  Indeed,  if  such  omissions  constituted 
my  reproach,  then  the  critic  in  *  Blackwood  '  was  liable  to  his  own 
censure.  For  I  remember  to  this  hour  several  Latin  quotations  made 
by  Schelling,  and  repeated  by  Coleridge  as  his  own,  which  neither  I 
nor  my  too  rigorous  reviewer  had  drawn  out  for  public  exposure.  As 
regarded  myself,  it  was  quite  sufficient  that  I  had  indicated  the 
grounds,  and  opened  the  paths,  on  which  the  game  must  be  sought; 
that  I  left  the  rest  of  the  chase  to  others,  was  no  subject  for  blame, 
but  part  of  my  purpose;  and,  under  the  circumstances,  very  much  a 
matter  of  necessity. 

In  taking  leave  of  this  affair,  I  ought  to  point  out  a  ground  of 
lomplaint  against  my  reviewer  under  his  present  form  of  expression, 
^hich  I  am  sure  could  not  have  been  designed.  It  happened  that  I 
had  forgotten  the  particular  title  of  Schelling's  work  :  naturallj 


NOTES. 


707 


ivord  inadvertently.  I,  therefore,  greatly  understated  the  cas« 
against  Coleridge,  instead  of  giving  to  it  an  undue  emphasis. 
Secondly,  in  stating  it  at  all,  I  did  so  (as  at  the  time  I  explained) 
in  pure  kindness.  Well  I  knew  that,  from  the  direction  ir 
which  English  philosophic  studies  were  now  travelling,  sooner 
or  later  these  appropriations  of  Coleridge  must  be  detected ; 
and  I  feU  that  it  would  break  the  force  of  the  discovery,  as  an 
unmitigated  sort  of  police  detection,  if  first  of  all  it  had  been 
announced  by  one  who,  in  the  same  breatli,  was  professing  an 
unshaken  faith  in  Coleridge's  philosophic  power.  It  could  not 
be  argued  that  one  of  those  who  most  fervently  admired 
Coleridge,  had  professed  such  feelings  only  because  he  was 
ignorant  of  Coleridge's  obligations  to  others.  Here  was  a 
man  who  had  actually  for  himself,  unguided  and  unwarned, 
discovered  these  obligations ;  and  yet,  in  the  very  act  of 
making  that  discovery,  this  man  clung  to  his  original  feelings 
and  faith.  But,  thirdly,  I  must  inform  the  reader,  that  I  was 
not,  nor  ever  had  been,  the  '  friend  '  of  Coleridge  in  any  sense 
which  could  have  a  right  to  restrain  my  frankest  opinions  upon 
his  merits.  I  never  had  lived  in  such  intercourse  with  Coler- 
idge as  to  give  me  an  opportunity  of  becoming  his  friend.  To 
him  I  owed  nothing  at  all :  but  to  the  public,  to  the  body  of 
his  own  readers,  every  writer  owes  the  truth,  and  especially  on 
a  subject  so  important  as  that  which  was  then  before  me. 

With  respect  to  the  comparatively  trivial  case  of  Pythag- 

enough  in  a  situation  where  no  foreign  books  could  be  had,  I  quoted 
it  under  a  false  one.  And  this  inevitable  error  of  mine  on  a  matter 
so  entirely  irrelevant  is  so  described,  that  the  neutral  reader  might 
suppose  me  to  have  committed  against  Coleridge  the  crime  of  Lauder 
against  Milton  —  that  is,  taxing  him  with  plagiarism  by  referring, 
not  to  real  works  of  Schelling,  but  to  pretended  works,  of  which  the 
very  titles  were  forgeries  of  my  own.  This,  I  am  sure,  my  unknown 
«ritic  never  could  have  meant.  The  plagiarisms  were  really  there: 
at)re  and  worse  in  circumstances  than  any  denounced  by  myself : 
iiid,  of  all  men,  the  *  Blackwood  '  critic  was  the  most  bound  to  pro- 
claim this  :  or  else  what  became  of  his  own  clamorous  outcry  ? 
Being,  therefore,  such  as  I  had  represented,  of  what  consequence 
was  the  special  title  of  the  German  volume  to  which  these  plagiarism! 
were  referred  ? 


NOTES. 


oras,  an  author  of  great  distinction  in  literature,  and  in  the 
Anglican  Church,  has  professed  himself  unable  to  understand 
what  room  there  could  be  for  plagiarism  in  a  case  where  the 
solution  asciibed  to  Coleridge  was  amongst  the  commonplaces 
of  ordinai-y  English  academic  tuition.  Locally  this  may  have 
been  so ;  but  hardly,  I  conceive,  in  so  large  an  extent  as  to 
make  that  solution  publici  juris.  Yet,  however  this  may  be, 
no  help  is  given  to  Coleridge  ;  since,  according  to  Mr.  Poole  8 
story,  whether  the  interpretation  of  the  riddle  were  or  were  not 
generally  diffused,  Coleridge  claimed  it  for  his  own. 

Finally  —  for  distance  from  the  press  and  other  inconven- 
iences of  unusual  pressure  oblige  me  to  wind  up  suddenly  — 
the  whole  spirit  of  my  record  at  the  time  (twenty  years  ago), 
and  in  particular  the  special  allusion  to  the  last  Duke  of  An- 
caster's  case,  as  one  which  ran  parallel  to  Coleridge's,  involving 
the  same  propensity  to  appropriate  what  generally  were  trifles 
in  the  midst  of  enormous  and  redundant  wealth,  survives  as  an 
indication  of  the  animus  with  which  I  approached  this  subject, 
starting  even  from  the  assumption  I  was  bound  to  consider  my- 
self under  the  restraints  of  friendship  —  which,  for  the  second 
time  let  me  repeat,  I  was  not.  In  reality,  the  notes  contributed 
to  the  Aldine  edition  of  the  *  Biographia  Literaria.'  by  Coler- 
idge's admirable  daughter,  have  placed  this  whole  subject  in  a 
new  light  ;  and  in  doing  this,  have  unavoidably  reflected  some 
degree  of  justification  upon  myself.  Too  much  so,  I  understand 
to  be  the  feeling  in  some  quarters.  This  lamented  lady  is 
thought  to  have  shown  partialities  in  her  distributions  of  praise 
and  blame  upon  this  subject.  1  will  not  here  enter  into  that 
discussion.  But,  as  respects  the  justification  of  her  father,  I 
regard  her  mode  of  argument  as  uxiassailable.  Filial  piety  the 
most  tender  never  was  so  finely  reconciled  with  candor  towards 
the  fiercest  of  his  antagonists.  Wherever  the  plagiarism  was 
undeniable,  she  has  allowed  it ;  whilst  palliating  its  faultiness 
by  showing  the  circumstances  under  which  it  arose.  But  she 
has  also  opened  a  new  view  of  other  circumstances  under  which 
vn  apparent  plagiarism  arose  that  was  not  real.  I  myself,  for 
instance,  knew  cases  were  Coleridge  gave  to  young  ladies  a  copy 
^f  verses  headed  thus  —  *  Lines  on  ,  from  the  German  of 


NOTES. 


709 


Holty.'  Other  young  ladies  made  transcripts  of  these  lines  , 
and,  caring  nothing  for  the  German  authorship,  naturally 
fathered  them  upon  Coleridge,  the  translator.  These  lines  were 
subsequently  circulated  as  Coleridge's,  and  as  if  on  Coleridge 
own  authority.  Thus  arose  many  cases  of  apparent  plagiaribm 
And,  lastly,  as  his  daughter  most  truly  reports,  if  he  took  — 
be  gave.  Continually  he  fancied  other  men's  tlioughts  his 
jwn  ;  but  such  were  the  contusions  of  his  memory,  that  con- 
tinually, and  with  even  greater  liberality,  he  ascribed  his  own 
thouffhts  to  others. 

An  important  oversight  occurs  in  this  long  final  note  upon 
Coleridge's  plagiarisms.  The  solution  of  the  Pythagorean  dark 
Ba^^ing  about  beans,  (concerning  the  appropriation  of  whicJi  by 
Coleridge  such  varied  opinions  have  been  pronounced,)  does  not 
need  to  be  sought  in  German  editions  of  Pythagoras,  nor  in  the 
traditions  of  academic  tuition  :  it  is  to  be  found  in  Plutarch. 
An  hour  or  two  after  I  had  sent  off  this  final  note  to  the  press, 
[distant  unfortunately  seven  miles,  and  accessible  only  by  a 
discontinuous  or  zigzag  line  of  communications,]  I  remembered 
from  a  foot-note  on  Jeremy  Taylor's  '  Holy  Living,'  the  follow- 
ing reference  to  Plutarch  ;  which  the  bishop  has  chosen  (against 
his  usual  practice)  to  give  in  Latin  rather  than  in  Greek  :  — 
^Fabis  ahstine,^  dixit  Pythagoras,  *  olim  enim  magistratus  per 
Buffragia  fabis  lata  creabantur.'  Abstain  from  beans,  said 
Pythagoras,  for  in  former  times  magisterial  offices  were  created 
through  suffrages  conveyed  by  beans. 

Note  3,  page  192. 

Pretty  broken  English.''^  Published  in  Richardson's  coiv 
iBspondence. 

Note  4,  page  292. 

The  farthest  depths  of  Canada.^  ^  The  English  language  is 
travelling  fast  towards  the  fulfilment  of  its  destiny.  Through 
\he  influence  of  the  dreadful  Republic,*  that  within  the  thirty 

*  Not  many  months  ago,  the  blind  hostility  of  the  Irish  newspaper 
•ditors  in  America  forged  a  ludicrous  estimate  of  the  Irish  numerc^ 


ilO 


NOTES. 


last  years  has  run  through  all  the  stages  of  infancy  into  the 
first  stage  ot  maturity,  and  through  the  English  colonies  — 
African,  Canadian,  Indian,  Australian  —  the  English  language 
(and,  therefore,  the  English  literature)  is  running  forward 
towards  its  ultimate  mission  of  eating  up,  like  Aaron's  rod, 
all  other  languages.  Even  the  German  and  the  Spanish  will 
inevitably  sink  before  it  ;  perhaps  within  100  or  150  years. 
In  the  recesses  of  California,  in  the  vast  solitudes  of  Austra- 
lia, "  The  Churchyiird  amongst  the  Mountains,"  irom  Words- 
worth's "Excursion,"  and  many  a  scene  of  his  shorter  poems, 
will  be  read,  even  as  now  Shakspere  is  read  amongst  the  for- 
ests of  Canada.  All  which  relates  to  the  writer  of  these 
poems  will  then  bear  a  value  of  the  same  kind  as  that  which 
attaches  to  our  i)ersonal  memorials  (unhappily  so  slender)  of 
Shakspere. 

Note  5,  page  436. 

Some  shade  of  discountennnce.'^^  But  still  nothing  at  all 
in  England  by  comparison  with  its  gloomy  excess  in  Scotland. 
In  the  present  generation,  the  rancorous  bigotry  of  this  feeling 
has  been  considerably  mitigated.  But,  if  the  reader  wishes 
to  view  it  in  its  ancient  strength,  I  advise  him  to  look  into  the 
"  Life  of  Alexander  Alexander  "  (2  vols.  1830).  He  was  a  poor 
outcast,  whose  latter  days  were  sheltered  from  ruin  by  the 
munificence  of  the  late  Mr.  Blackwood,  senior. 

preponderance  in  the  United  States,  from  which  it  was  inferred,  as  at 
least  a  possibility,  that  the  Irish  Celtic  language  might  come  to  dispute 
the  preeminence  with  the  English.  Others  anticipated  the  same  destiny 
for  the  German.  But,  in  the  mean  time,  the  unresting  career  of  the  law- 
courts,  of  commerce,  and  of  the  national  Senate,  that  cannot  suspend 
themselves  for  an  hour,  reduce  the  case  to  this  dilemma  :  If  the  Irish 
and  the  Germans  in  the  United  States  adapt  their  general  schemes  of 
education  to  the  service  of  their  pubHc  ambition,  they  must  begin  bv 
training  themselves  to  the  use  of  the  language  now  prevailing  on  all 
the  available  stages  of  ambition.  On  the  other  hand,  by  refusing  tc 
do  this,  they  lost*  the  very  outset  every  point  of  advantage.  In  othei 
words,  adopting  the  English,  they  renounce  the  contest  —  not  adopting 
It,  they  disqualify  themselves  fcr  the  contest. 


NOTES. 


711 


"Note  6,  page  454. 

The  Jirst  heavy  wound''  The  reference  is  to  the  death 
of  little  Kate  Wordsworth,  spoken  of  later  in  the  volume. 
In  the  latest  edition  of  his  writings,  De  Quincey  adds  at  this 
point  the  following  passage  :  — ] 

From  a  gathering  of  years,  fax  ahead  of  the  events, 
looking  back  by  accident  to  this  whole  little  cottage  romanc<3 
of  Blentarn  Ghyll,  with  its  ups  and  downs,  its  lights  and 
shadows,  and  its  fitful  alternations,  of  grandeur  derived  from 
mountain  solitude,  and  of  humility  derived  from  the  very 
lowliest  poverty,  its  little  faithful  Agnes  keeping  up  her  rec- 
ords of  time  in  harmony  with  the  mighty  world  outside,  and 
feeding  the  single  cow  —  the  total  '  estate  '  of  the  new-made 
orphans  —  I  thought  of  that  beautiful  Persian  apologue,  where 
some  slender  drop,  or  crystallizing  filament,  within  the  shell  of 
an  oyster,  fancies  itself  called  upon  to  bewail  its  own  obscure 
lot  —  consigned  apparently  and  irretrievably  to  the  gloomiest 
depths  of  the  Persian  Gulf.  But  changes  happen,  good  and 
bad  luck  will  fall  out,  even  in  the  darkest  depths  of  the  Per- 
sian Gulf  ;  and  messages  of  joy  can  reach  those  that  wait  in 
silence,  even  where  no  post-horn  has  ever  sounded.  Behold  ! 
the  slender  filament  has  ripened  into  the  most  glorious  of 
pearls.  In  a  happy  hour  for  himself,  some  diver  from  the 
blossoming  forests  of  Ceylon  brings  up  to  heavenly  light  the 
matchless  pearl  ;  and  very  soon  that  solitary  crystal  drop, 
that  had  bemoaned  its  own  obscure  lot,  finds  itself  glorifying 
the  central  cluster  in  the  tiara  bound  upon  the  brow  of  him 
who  signed  himself  *  King  of  kings,'  the  Shah  of  Persia,  and 
that  shook  all  Asia  from  the  Indus  to  the  Euphrates.  Not 
otherwise  was  the  lot  of  little  Agnes  —  faithful  to  duties  so 
suddenly  revealed  amidst  terrors  ghostly  as  well  as  earthly  — 
paying  down  her  first  tribute  of  tears  to  an  afl^iction  that 
seemed  past  all  relief,  and  such,  that  at  first  she  with  her 
Vothers  and  sisters  seemed  foundering  simultaneously  with 
her  parents  in  one  mighty  darkness.  And  yet,  because,  under 
Uie  strange  responsibilities  which  had  suddenly  surprised  her, 
she  sought  counsel  and  strength  from  God,  teaching  her 


12 


NOTES. 


brothers  and  sisters  to  do  the  same,  and  seemed  (when  alont 
at  midnight)  to  hear  her  mother's  voice  calling  to  her  from 
the  hills  above,  one  moon  had  scarcely  finished  its  circuit,  be- 
fore the  most  august  ladies  on  our  planet  were  reading,  with 
sympathizing  tears,  of  Agnes  Green ;  and  from  the  towers  of 
Windsor  Castle  came  gracious  messages  of  inquiry  to  little, 
lowly  Blentarn  Ghyll." 

Note  7,  page  459. 

"  To  Ms  only  friend.''''  This  story  has  been  made  the  sub- 
ject of  a  separate  poem,  entitled  The  Student  of  St.  Bees,'* 
by  my  friend  Mr.  James  Payn  of  Cambridge.  The  volume  is 
published  by  Macmillan,  Cambridge,  and  contains  thoughts 
of  great  beauty,  too  likely  to  escape  the  vapid  and  irreflective 
reader. 

Note  8,  page  507. 

[**  L  The  heading  of  the  chapter  supplies  the  name 

Lloyd  for  all  these  innocently  eniojmaUeal  dashes.] 


